Commissioned by composer Michael Markowski for his wind band piece of the same name. | size: 15×19″

The Cave You Fear is obviously about fear, but I don’t think it’s about simple phobias such as heights or spiders. It’s more like a complex fear of new things, of impossible odds, of failure, and of different perspectives. And, even though the music is really scary-sounding for a middle school level piece, it still maintains an exciting and adventurous atmosphere. It’s got a beautiful movie-soundtrack-ish splendor to it, like a lot of Markowski’s other pieces have.

That’s basically what this paper cutting is about. I wanted to make something creepy centered around many complex fears, but also as beautiful as Markowski’s writing.

Markowski wrote in the program notes for this piece that he was partially inspired by his daunting move from Nowhere to New York City, which is why the paper cutting is sort of city-themed.