This is a cartoon representation of when the author of “Pilgrim at Tinker Creek”, Annie Dillard, first shocked the reader with the raw horror that is apart of the natural world.

In the first Chapter, “Heaven and Earth in Jest”, Dillard describes staring at the frog in the creek as “. . . he slowly crumpled and began to sag . . . he was shrinking before my eyes like a deflating football . . . it was a monstrous and terrifying thing. I gaped bewildered, appalled. An oval shadow hung in the water behind the drained frog; then the shadow glided away.”

This piece of art was created using acrylic paint, pen and ink on 18×20 inch pressed cardboard.

Applying improve techniques to significant scenes described in the novel, “Pilgrim at Tinker Creek” is what shaped this piece of art. Depicting different parts of the novel through sketches is how this piece came about.

The cruelty of nature is something that I found myself thinking about often during the past year, both from reading Annie Dillard’s “Pilgrim at Tinker Creek”, and by experiencing the negative effects of nature directly during “deeper exploration” by accumulating a multitude of tick bites this past summer. This made creating a satirical and humorous piece of art that mocked nature’s dark side my goal.

The description that Annie Dillard gave in Chapter One regarding the frog’s unexpected demise via the water bug was the first of many details in the book that yielded to nature’s apparent existential apathy.

In what other ways can darker scenarios of life be jested with?

During the process of creating this particular piece, I confirmed that having fun during an artwork’s conception is key to it’s overall outcome.