Australian Artist Censored

On February 6th, the Mayor of Blacktown Australia banned anti-war street artwork by artist Zanny Begg. The artist’s works consisted of life-sized poster cut-outs of a US soldier gripping his M-16 rifle. Each wildly painted artwork incorporated the words, Checkpoint for Weapons of Mass Distraction. Hmm… whatever happened to those weapons of mass destruction we went to war over? The…

Jacob Lawrence: Painter of History

I first discovered the works of Black American artist Jacob Lawrence, as a teenager in the late 1960’s. Inspired by the Civil Rights Movement and the rising tide of dissent all around me, I was naturally enthusiastic over Lawrence’s epic series regarding the great Haitian slave rebellion of 1791. Lawrence was only twenty one when he completed his forty one…

|

It’s Fun To Shoot Some People

Back in December I wrote that Universal Pictures was going to produce, No True Glory: Battle for Fallujah, a pro-war film with Harrison Ford starring as Lt. Gen. James Mattis. Well the news just keeps getting stranger and stranger. At a recent forum Gen. Mattis publicly said: “Actually, it’s a lot of fun to fight. You know, it’s a hell…

Mesopotamia Endangered

When the US Army captured Iraq’s capital of Baghdad in April of 2003, people around the world were shocked by the whirlwind of looting that followed in the wake of liberation. Quick to seize and guard Iraq’s Oil Ministry, US forces left other government buildings unprotected and open to pillage by throngs of impoverished Iraqis. The country’s art and history…

Architect Philip Johnson – RIP

Pioneering American architect Philip Johnson died on Tuesday, January 25th, 2005, he was 98 years old. His controversial designs encompassed everything from magnificent corporate headquarters to the Crystal Cathedral in Los Angeles. Johnson coined the architectural term international style and invented the role of museum architecture curator at New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) in 1931. Terrence Riley, the…

Germany’s Art Controversies

In Berlin Germany, the Kunst-Werke Institute for Contemporary Art opened a major exhibition on January 29th, 2005 – Regarding Terror: The RAF Exhibition. Through the works of some 40 contemporary artists working in various media, the exhibit focuses on Germany’s infamous terrorist organization, Red Army Faction (RAF). In the 1970’s and 80’s, the communist urban guerilla group conducted a violent…

Body Worlds: The Art of Plastic Corpses?

In 2004 the California Science Center in the Exposition Park of Los Angeles, presented Body Worlds: The Anatomical Exhibition of Real Human Bodies. In the words of the museum, “Thanks to the breakthrough process of plastination, more than 200 real human specimens are displayed to reveal an extraordinary new look inside the human body.” As a realist artist I naturally…