Winifred McNeill

Artist

The Helen Fragments began with a chance encounter between Peter and me at a gallery in Sacramento, where he had gone to see another artist. Noticing my work, he recognized a tragic sensuality that bears a connection to that of Helen in Troy.

Around the same time, he saw that printer and poet Richard Seibert was deep into a translation of the Iliad. From there, the idea to tease out a woman’s story from the decidedly male-obsessed epic was born. At Peter’s urging, I flew out from a winter in Hoboken to visit his light-filled Berkely studio. There, I met Richard, and we began to discuss Helen’s sad but sexy story.

Richard selected and translated verses that he wove together to show a complex, messy woman who rages, cries, vamps and mourns; she is not a stoic. This Helen is a real person not a plot device. In this telling of the story, the protagonists are drawn in the nude save for helmets and high heels. They act out their destiny on narrow stages formed by the classical friezes drawn above and below each performance. l made over five hundred ink drawings, from which fifty were selected to accompany each verse of the narrative.

In Berkeley, I watched as the presses, each in their own way, released beautifully designed pages into the world. Adjusting to Berkeley time, I came to appreciate the importance of the lunch break, and the flavors of the west coast. Peter floated, ever so cheerfully, over all the details, guiding the process with a deft hand. Some nights, there would be the extra treat of a dinner prepared by Susan Filter and enjoyed by a wide range of artists and thinkers. The drawings emerged, conjured from this rich brew.