Leon Aarts – I AM (c. 2016, acrylic on paper) Gifted to a very good friend

A fractured billboard for the self. I AM is the sequel that detonates the original, where the 2015 I AM was a monolith, this is a demolition site. The letters are now shattered into four quadrants, each a different ruin: the “I” a rust-red tower, the “A” a silver shard, the “M” a spiraling wound. Painted on flimsy paper, it is Aarts’ most brutal self-interrogation—identity as rubble, rebuilt in duct tape and denial.

I AM (Inri) is the original I AM after the earthquake—same voice, shattered throat. It is Aarts’ most honest work: the self not affirmed but excavated, letters as fossils in the rubble of home. Pin it to a wall with rusted nails; let it sag, let it tear, let it be the ruin it proclaims.

Score (out of 10): 9.4 Four letters, four wounds, one exile, God’s name in a demolition zone.