The essence of a Byzantine icon is significance - the
signature - the meaning.  Not in terms of content, like language, but in
terms of ontology, like tone.  Icons protect, heal, destroy - you
beseech specific saints for specific needs in a system
of signs.

And this?

Figurative elements (an eye, limbs, a torso, a
ribcage) rendered in a use of color we might call ‘inspired’, as if
guided by the hand of a saint.  Holding a blunt, the body of the figure
blends into itself.  Not mixed/blended, like grey,
but tumbled together as discrete but uninterpretable parts.  The
body is thrown into question.  The only interpretable elements of the
body are a bare ribcage, the eye, and the blunt.  These are the most
important signs.

Within the ribcage is situated an abstract shape
like a star - like a soul or core. This core is un-tumbled, like the eye and
the blunt, while the rest of the body becomes ‘one”.

Is this an expression of martyrdom? Or merely an
expression of the subconscious while high?  The body is flayed and
dismembered, but the soul of the person (the star, the eye) remains -
perhaps by virtue of the Saint of the Blunt.  I do
not find solace in mind-altering substances, but I recognize that many
do.  Perhaps the artist contends with the chaos and abject of the world
with a controlled self-inflicted chaos, finding protection in the high.
This icon shares this protection with us all.  

That we will be torn apart, but the core of who we are remains - by
the aid of this saint.