“Harbingers 1260” (2025), acrylic and mixed media on wood panel, 5 x 5′
As far back as I can remember, we were told that choice was part of life; the choices you make dictate the life you live. But what I’ve observed is that we are slowly being forced to give up our abilities to choose, one of the things that is most important to nurturing the soul. — Michael Toombs
Kansas City artist Michael Toombs evokes an ominous and searing conflation of existential crisis, spiritual reckoning and celestial transformation in his breakthrough series of new paintings, titled “RTTIN.” Through this work, Toombs urges us to reclaim our inherent abilities of discernment and truth amidst imbalance and havoc to save our souls.
“We are giving up access to our souls much too early,” Toombs said recently at his home studio, summarizing the essence of “RTTIN” as “unlocking truth” and “revealing some of the attributes we’ve forgotten: the spiritual side, the soulful side, things we know to be true.”
Toombs is known for his prolific murals and public art projects, including “Non Nobis Solum,” a four-panel painting commissioned in 2023 by Washburn University School of Law in Topeka to commemorate Brown v. Board of Education. He identifies the project as a turning point, leading him back into full-time painting for the first time in 20 years and opening him to the “RTTIN” series. He said he isn’t ready to divulge what RTTIN stands for, other than it’s a “spiritual acronym.”
With five paintings completed and several in progress, “RTTIN” conveys an apocalyptic, connective vision Toombs describes as being “in the moment and inspired by what’s happening now.” He employs an allegorical fusion of realism and mystical surrealism with luminous layers of acrylic on wood panel or canvas to achieve exquisite and distinct compositions infused with a fervent panoply of scriptural, symbolic and contemporary references.
Marcia Pomeroy, Toombs’ wife and longtime collaborator, contributed interpretive narratives that help contextualize works in “RTTIN,” along with the foundational precursors, “C-19,” “Broken Promises,” “Uncle Sam I am,” “Thoughts and Prayers” and “The Word: Truth and Consequences.”
Toombs launched “RTTIN” with the “The Faithful” in March 2025, a brutal work articulating street-level mob violence, guttural rage and anguish, religious persecution and sanctimony in a frenetic montage of historical figures within a public square. The composition includes Jesus, rising in the foreground from a falling cross, William Tyndale, executed as a heretic in 1536, and the small, chortling figures of Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito observing the bedlam.
“Harbingers 1260” references The Book of Revelation (11:3) in a portentous, darkly alluring portrayal of two spectral harbingers in flowing sackcloth. The figures emerge from a dimensional, textured foreground with two olive trees beneath a deep, turbulent sky, “warning of what is to come, thereby giving humanity an opportunity to change their ways,” Pomeroy notes.
Radiant light and fierce purpose emanate from “Qavah/Archangel,” capturing the electrifying gaze and formidable restraint of an unnamed celestial warrior in flowing white and gleaming armor, wielding a red-tipped sword. Pomeroy’s text indicates “Qavah” means “wait” in Hebrew, or in other translations, “waiting very actively.”
“Transform – Psychopomp” conveys a magnificent, cosmic crescendo of planetary turmoil, transience, doom and sublime transcendence. Intricate, iridescent depictions of a dragonfly’s three-part metamorphosis symbolize transformation to another plane, reflecting the elegant, balanced transition of body, soul and spirit into a cerulean, celestial dimension.
The latest work in “RTTIN,” “AI/Singularity/What’s Going On?” envisions a tragic, Orwellian unfolding of conflicted despondency and the peril of AI, as robots become the thinkers while humanity acquiesces mind and spirit to an enflamed, omnipotent Eye.
ALL IMAGES COURTESY OF THE ARTIST
