The letter X holds a unique place in the English language. It is the most sought after letter by both pirates and scrabble players in possession of the letters A, N, T, H, R, and A. But what of the legends who have donned this letter – and this letter alone – as a name? There was Malcolm X, a powerful and passionate leader during the Civil Rights movement. There is Professor X, a New Yorker and leader of the X-Men, who is well known for both his high-level telepathy and inexplicable British accent. Of course one of the most prolific professional eaters of the past 20 years is Tim Janus, known to most by the name Eater X. His devouring of 12.1 pounds of burritos in 12 minutes was one of the most exciting happenings in 2007. Then there is Racer X, known both as the older brother of Speed Racer and the character that marked the beginning of the end of Matthew Fox’s movie career. Some say that Racer X is the most mysterious of these X’s, but this is not true, not as long as Artist X is still around.
Artist X was born in 1846 near the outskirts of Cairo. His Belgian parents had moved there 3 years prior when eggplants were discovered to be edible, and not solely for decorative purposes. The Great Eggplant Rush of 1843 brought many aspiring eggplant farmers to Egypt, but none was as cunning as the father of Artist X. His son, in turn, was born into a fast-paced world of greed and eggplants. Here is one of Artist X’s earliest sketches:
The high-octane eggplants deals consumed his family, but Artist X escaped, running away to America. When the Civil War broke out, Artist X was unfazed, citing that it wasn’t really any of his business so he didn’t want to get involved. X did get involved, however, with the 1876 presidential campaign of Samuel J. Tilden. X was intrigued by Tilden’s anti-eggplant importation stance, and created most of Tilden’s campaign posters, including this iconic watercolor poster attacking Tilden’s opponent Rutherford B. Hayes:
When Artist X received the news of Tilden’s crushing defeat, he went into a definitive state of shock, almost suspended in time. When he awoke from his coma, the year was 1991, and Artist X merely accepted the recent strange occurrences in his life as a sign that he was born in the wrong time, like a modern day opera singer or a medieval plumber, and the universe was now doing right by him. Yet he soon realized that with this newfound life, Artist X was given a unique power. Each time he would create his art, Artist X would paint a scene from the future, but this was totally before Heroes character Isaac Mendez made future painting popular. However much like Cassandra of ancient times, Artist X could only paint scenes of perilous, unavoidable disasters.
His “Birth of Oden”, also known as “Death of Portland” portrays Greg Oden’s draft day handshake with Dvorak Baggins, or, as he is known in non-hobbit circles, David Stern. Oden joined the Blazers’ franchise and immediately began blowing out his knees in 2007. This illustration of the event was made by Artist X in 1998.
Artist X has painted some of the most tragic disasters of our time, from tornadoes to riots to the 2000 election, and he is of course most well known for his impressionist work pictured above, entitled “How Can You Be So Heartless?”. The painting exhibits a scene from Kanye West’s “film” Runaway. This catastrophe occurred in 2010, but Artist X painted his masterpiece on July 18th, 1994.
Yet the greatest calling card of Artist X is his masked persona. Much like Racer X, the true identity Artist X is only known by little kids who are watching their televisions and yelling, “No Speed Racer! Don’t try to kill him! He’s your brother!” But perhaps the true identity of Artist X should never be revealed, as nobody can understand my anguished, artistic vision…I mean his anguished, artistic vision.
Crap.