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All three floors of the beautiful turn-of-the-century Beaux-Arts building that houses the Meridian Gallery in San Francisco, California, were packed full of people during the September 4th, 2008, opening reception of the Meridian\u2019s War & Empire<\/em> exhibition. As the show runs until election night on November 4th, consider this pithy article to be merely the briefest of updates on what has truly turned out to be a landmark show.<\/p>\n I drove up to the San Francisco Bay area from Los Angeles to attend the exhibit as a participating artist and also to assist the gallery in producing a short video documentary on the show – which should be available on my web log sometime by mid-October. As part of the video project I talked to a number of the exhibit\u2019s other participating artists, including the co-curators of the show, Anne Trueblood Brodzky, Art Hazelwood and DeWitt Cheng, who eloquently spoke of the exhibit\u2019s history and purpose.<\/p>\n I also conducted interviews with the Director and Curator of the American University Museum in Washington, D.C., Jack Rasmussen – as well as with the respected art historian, author, and former curator of New York\u2019s Museum of Modern Art, Peter Selz. Both of these gentlemen offered tremendous insights on the subject of contemporary political art. In the weeks to come I will also be writing a review of the War & Empire<\/em> exhibit to be published on the Foreign Policy In Focus website. That illustrated article will present an overview of the Meridian\u2019s exhibit, as well as interviews with participating artists Sandow Birk, Guy Colwell, Art Hazelwood, and Juan Fuentes.<\/p>\n For those who thirst for press reviews of the exhibition, here is a short blurb from ArtBusiness.com<\/a>, a website that covers exhibit openings in the San Francisco Bay area of California. Reviewer Alan Bamberger wrote that the War & Empire<\/em> show: “(\u2026) cries out in opposition to the catastrophic domestic disasters of recent years including war, reduced personal freedoms, the concentration of wealth among the few at the expense of the many, environmental degradation, and more. Three floors of overwhelmingly well-placed outrage exemplify freedom of speech at its finest – take advantage of it while we still have it.” Of course Bamberger is correct, but even his exclamatory remarks fail to convey the depth and breadth of this extraordinary exhibition.<\/p>\n In War & Empire<\/em>, one is treated to the humorous and Zen-like figurative minimalism of maverick William T. Wiley<\/a>, the ominous metal and glass sculptures of Bella Feldman<\/a>; which seem like the malevolent war toys of children from some militaristic alien race, and the raw and inflamed Abu Ghraib<\/em> canvases of Fernando Botero; which up close possess a refined painterly quality reminiscent of Eug\u00e8ne Delacroix. There are many handmade prints in the show, running the gambit from Fernando Marti\u2019s marvelous color etching, Poppies<\/em>; a meditation on the linkage between the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan on the proliferation of heroin-producing poppy fields in that country – to Art Hazelwood\u2019s devastating Fallujah<\/em>, an expressionist-like woodcut that depicts massacred civilians beneath the rubble of that unfortunate war-ruined city in Iraq\u2019s Al Anbar province.<\/p>\n What makes the War & Empire<\/em> exhibit singularly astonishing is that it so easily encompasses a diversity of aesthetic styles from artists who would ordinarily not be exhibiting together; from those whose works embody the rarified high concepts of the “fine art” world, to those “street artists” and illustrators whose works are primarily aimed at a mass audience. The exhibition unflinchingly incorporates installation, sculpture, painting, drawing, printmaking, and photography to great effect, with the entire endeavor being of the highest quality and held together by a grand thematic vision – the yearning for a better world and revulsion for the way that things are. That dissimilar artists of all ages who have disparate cultural and ethnic backgrounds, working in a multiplicity of techniques and approaches, can so successfully make a collective statement regarding current political realities, indicates a new and vibrant social engagement in American art.<\/p>\n![\"War](\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/images\/sept08\/meridian_poster.gif\")
<\/p>\n[ War & Empire<\/em> – Official poster for the Meridian exhibit. Designed by artist Juan Fuentes and based upon his original linoleum cut. ]<\/span><\/div>\n![\"Paintings](\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/images\/sept08\/meridian_botero.jpg\")
<\/p>\n[ Abu Ghraib # 54<\/em> – Fernando Botero, 2005. Oil on canvas. 12″ x 14″. Collection of American University Museum, Washington, DC. “A refined painterly quality reminiscent of Eug\u00e8ne Delacroix.” Photo by Mark Vallen. ]<\/span><\/div>\n![\"Painting](\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/images\/sept08\/merdian_colwell.jpg\")
<\/p>\n[ Abuse<\/em> – Guy Colwell. Acrylic on canvas. 2004. Colwell\u2019s controversial painting depicting the torture of Iraqi prisoners at the hands of U.S. jailers while held in Abu Ghraib prison. Photo by Ken Duffy. View Duffy\u2019s photos<\/a> of the Meridian opening on Flickr. ]<\/span><\/div>\n![\"Artwork](\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/images\/sept08\/meridian_geronimo.jpg\")
<\/p>\n[ Helicopter <\/em>– RIGO. 2002. Push pins on wood. 45″ x 45″ Courtesy of the artist and Gallery Paule Anglim. The portrait depicts Geronimo (Goyathlay – or “one who yawns”), the famed Chiricahua Apache leader who led his people in fierce armed resistance against white settlement of Apache land in Arizona and New Mexico. Photo by Mark Vallen. ]<\/span><\/div>\n![\"Sculpture](\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/images\/sept08\/meridian_feldman.jpg\")
<\/p>\n[ War Toys<\/em> – Bella Feldman. 2003 – Present. Installation with metal and glass sculptures. “Like the malevolent war toys of children from some militaristic alien race.” Repeated text is incorporated into the installation, reading; “Weapons of Mass Destruction, Daisy Cutter, Water Boarding, Embedded, Neutralize, Enduring Freedom, Surgical Strike, Carpet Bombing.” Photo by Mark Vallen. ]<\/span><\/div>\n
![\"Print](\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/images\/sept08\/meridian_drooker.jpg\")
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