Slow Numbers, 2001, Oil on Linen, 11"w x 17"h

This piece was inspired by the song "Slow Numbers" by the late Mark Sandman, of the band Morphine. The song is on their 2000 album "The Night" released posthumously.

Sandman died unexpectedly of a heart attack at the age of 46, possibly as result of a weakened heart from a near-death experience of being stabbed in the heart when he was a cab driver years earlier.

He created the two-string slide bass guitar as his instrument, emblematic of Morphine's unique, stripped down poetry and sound. It may not be for everyone because much of it can be extremely slow and dark, and I get from it the feeling that Sandman always had a foot on the other side.

The song "Slow Numbers" begins as follows

Lazy boys and shy Dianes
One at a time, single file
They counted the low numbers
as they walked by

I count a high number, a low number,
among the slow numbers

The number four means nothing to me
But the number four means death in Chinese
Number seven's lucky in Japan      here
we don't give a damn

But on the elevator no thirteenth floor
On the elevator no thirteenth floor, thirteenth,
Going up, going up, going up

One other thing I have thought about in this and other number paintings is how many gifted mathematicians view even very large numbers as having distinctive personalities.

This piece, of course, is based on the number 13 and the significance of it – particularly that it portends death.

Also the painting is about the one and the three, adding up to 4, a numerological view of the numbers which distills them to a mystical, not mathematical significance.

Lynn Talbot, 2003