A grey plaza at dusk, filled to the horizon with a crowd of dark, faceless figures pressing toward a monumental stone doorway. The door has not closed. Three small wooden chairs are wedged in the gap, lit gold, holding it open, and behind them in the warm light sit packed suitcases and a child's coat. A sparrow stands on the middle chair, facing the crowd.

I painted the numbers of an election as physical weight. The crowd is enormous and it is losing to three chairs, because that is what falling short actually looks like: a mass that cannot pass through a gap held open by almost nothing. What I did not plan for, but what people see first, is the suitcases and the small coat inside. Someone in there is already packed. The gold light is not victory, it is the light of a room where a family is still safe tonight because a count came up three short. I gave the light to the chairs and the sparrow rather than the crowd because I wanted the eye to rest where the decision is being made, not where the noise is.