Spectral Pegasus / Dark Movements

An intense “marvelous and fateful game,” Spectral Pegasus / Dark Movements brings to the page a six-month blogosphere collaboration between Welsh painter Clive Hicks-Jenkins and American poet Jeffery Beam, depicting a Hero’s journey through death, resurrection, psychological and spiritual trials, and revelations into redemptive vision. Originating loosely in an ancient Welsh folk tradition and the death of the painter’s father, painter and poet marry their impressive powers of myth and dream into individual but sympathetically resonant designs—inward landscapes wrought startlingly real—at turns plain and flamboyant, poignant and joyful. “The grace of these paintings and poems is in their wildness,” fashioned ultimately by Hicks-Jenkins’ and Beam’s compassionate confrontation with dark forces, reviving forgotten knowing and healing powers, as pilgrim/hero meets Horse/Man, thus “patching up some almighty fear in the fabric of heaven” and the searching self. Features twenty-one full color illustrations, sixteen poems, and illuminating essays by Sarah Parvin, Mary-Ann Constantine, and Claire Pickard. Book design by J.C. Mlozanowski.