APRIL BERMUDEZ
What Doesn't Kill Me
A series of artworks featuring some of my injuries, objects that have maimed, and circumstances where I was nearly killed.
The Shovel
Disclaimer: This story has been corroborated by my mother and older brother, who was there. I was four so my memories of the event are images and sounds.
The story takes place in 1982, in South Central Los Angeles. I was at a neighbors house, playing with a bunch of neighborhood kids. There was a pile of gravel in the driveway, along with a 3 foot shovel. One of the kids, who was 5 or 6, was playing with the shovel. I was nearby, standing with my back to the kid, little four year old me. Then someone called my name, so I turned. At that same moment the kid close by, too close actually, was lifting the shovel in the air. He swung the shovel right into my face as I turned. The sharp point of the blade sliced into the bridge of my nose.
I don't remember much after the shovel hit my nose, I suppose I lost consciousness for a few minutes. I remember my face being covered with a peach colored napkin and my blood blossoming on the napkin, turning the peach to red. And I remember my dad laying me on the dining room table, and he was making the BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEEP sounds like in an operating room, while he sutured my nose with a butterfly bandage.
The Shovel
illustration of three foot shovel
pencil, marker, chalk pastel on
chipboard packaging
​10 I/2 inches X 40 inches
Little Girl Falling Out of a Van
Little Girl Falling Out of a Van
acrylic, gesso, ink marker,
lead pencil, grease pencil
and oil pastel in reclaimed frame
31 inches x 33 inches
​
As a kid in the eighties, we rode in cars without seatbelts, some cars didn’t even have seatbelts. That was the case with the van my dad was driving in 1983. He mainly used it for his job as a carpenter, hauling tools and lumber, so the interior of the van was just the metal shell that was the body of the van itself. There was a driver’s and passenger bucket seats in the front of the van but in the back, the only “seats” were the wheels wells.
One afternoon, my dad was driving the van down the freeway with my mom and baby sister in the passenger seat and me, my older brother, and our older cousin, in the back. While we were speeding down the freeway, my brother, cousin, and I, were shifting and sliding in the back. I kept grabbing on to the handles of the rear doors in order to prevent the jostling, especially when my dad changed lanes and swerved a little. My mom would occasionally swivel her head towards the rear of the van and strongly tell me to take my hand off the handle and telling me that the doors could open. Not long after her last scolding, and some more wild driving by my dad, did I put my hand on the handle once more. Then my dad swerved, hard. And the doors flew open and I fell out. Both of my hands were quickly grabbed by my brother and cousin. I remember seeing the asphalt zooming past a few feet away from my face as I dangled out the back.
How my parents didn’t notice, I cannot be certain, but another car on the road sped up to the drivers side and yelled at my dad that his kids were hanging out of the van. My dad pulled the car to the side of the road, yelled at my cousin and smacked my brother.
I am beginning work on the next piece in the series. Another tragic circumstance that didn't take me out the game but instead gave me beautiful scars.