Erin W.
(Alias "Paint & Paste")

One can easily see, if you could glance again at that famous photo of the young Erin, that art would be his future. (You would note the unique art work on his T­-shirt, a curious blend of colors handmade by the boy from egg yolks, bird nests, and ground‑up beaver dung, proving that at even this early age he was doing art "his own way.")

It's clear that this well known figure in the world of art had made a great deal of headway in what was to become his future career by the time he happened to enroll in that stimulating class taught by the Legendary Mr. Christopherson. Young Erin was given the opportunity to design artistic backdrops and cue‑cards for the various sundry talented performers who were also privileged to attend the same Creative Expressions class.

It seems that up to the time of taking the wondrous class taught by Keithley’s Legendary Instructor, Erin had stuck pretty much to self decoration as a way of expressing himself artistically. Schoolmates were unlikely to forget his "Bramble Bush" getup, wherein he came to school one day wearing only a large sheet with 500 mulberry bush branches glued and stapled to it. This clever outfit was enhanced by the fact that the boy had dyed each branch with a different colored ultraviolet sensitive paint, giving a rainbow effect in the output of the UV lamp provided by a friend, who happily participated by following along behind with a 743 pound battery pack for the black light. Such creativity!

Erin was also king of the "body stencil" form of art. Perhaps the most remarkable of his many self‑art works was his "Britannica" shirt upon which he had somehow stenciled the entire text of the 1968 edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica. This shirt was in great demand by classmates who were about to take all sorts of tests. However, school authorities quickly banned it, regardless of its artistic value.

It was in the afore mentioned Creative Expressions class that young Erin came to realize, at the urging of the Legendary Mr. Christopherson, of course, that his artistic talent might be turned outward, so to speak. His art could be placed on walls, floors, ceilings, doors, trees, and so forth. Why, the whole world lay out there waiting for his fertile mind to decorate it.

Erin W. began by designing posters for class performers, as mentioned above. Most of his efforts were immensely successful. There was only one near‑disaster. Erin had pasted up an incredibly beautiful backdrop for April M. (see the April M. story), who clearly was destined to gain top billing in the world of show business. As luck would have it, Ms. M. generated a great deal of static electricity through a habit of often running her hand through her hair. The friction‑generated charge was extreme. Unfortunately, Erin had used in the poster a special paste which had an exceptionally low flash point temperature. During a particularly heavy sweep of April’s hand through her hair, a huge burst of lightning flashed to the poster, turning it into a sheet of flame that soon engulfed the entire room. Students ran screaming from the burning building and then stood cheering as it burned to the ground. (Note: The building was completely rebuilt over the next one and one‑half days with the help of the Legendary Mr. Christopherson’s science slush fund, since the great man understandably felt marginally responsible.)

As any art aficionado will testify, Erin has gone on to greater and greater things. His college years are referred to as the "Statue-Years," wherein the young man was busy perfecting his techniques. Many were the city halls and college boards that found themselves appropriating additional funds to refurbish statues after Erin had created them with his unique brand of "paint & paste" work.

Then, after earning his degree in Fine Arts from Washington State University, where he wrote his brilliant paper "Paste-On Wheat," he struck out on his own to decorate the world. Everywhere he visited, he left his tell‑tail mark. Remember the incredible photo of that large crowd of amazed, cheering Englishmen gathered along the coast of Norfolk gazing at Erin's paste-up, multicolored bridge which stretched across the channel to France, constructed entirely of fortune cookie papers all reading "France Sucks." This artistic feat was soon followed (some say to mollify the French) by artistically and totally engulfing the Eiffel Tower in Paris with long strips of wallpaper adorned by chartreuse fleur‑de‑lis with frogs sitting upon them.

Lately, Walsh has submerged himself in his newest project known simply as "Fly-Paper." In this momentous, and humanitarian work of art, Erin W. intends to paste together a paper airplane of such huge size that an entire city full of people could live on it as it glides serenely around the world. Reportedly, his major stumbling block at this time is finding the correct compromise between the strength (but heavy in weight) of construction paper and the fragility (though light in weight) of Kleenex‑‑materials from which he intends to build his artful aircraft.