While much art can be deemed political, political posters are the graphic manifestation of the body politic, often reflecting the thoughts of those protesting the status quo rather than those in power.
On Subversity, the KUCI public affairs program this afternoon, we chat with Carol Wells, the curator of an anti-war posters show currently at the Bergamont Station in Santa Monica, and with one of the artists, Robbie Conal. about art and politics especially now as George Bush prepares to expand the U.S. war in Iraq.
The show airs from 4-5 p.m. on KUCI, 88.9 fm in Orange County, California, and is web-cast at the same time via http://kuci.org.
Wells, who has collected thousands of political posters from around the world at her Center for the Study of Political Graphics, started off as a one-person collector. Robbie Conal, known as a guerrilla artist, is most famous for his plastering the streets of urban and suburban America (including Yorba Linda) with satirical posters of American politicians.
An L.A. Times art review of Wells' show recently earned the Times' art critic, Christopher Knight, an ex post facto disavowal from an anonymous Times editor, who wrote, in an extraordinary published rebuke, that Knight's characterization of George Bush's war plans as "imbecilic" was a "gratuitous political statement" that "should not have been published."
Resources:
Christopher Knight's review:
http://www.calendarlive.com/galleriesandmuseums/cl-et-knight15jan15.story
Knight responds to his readers:
http://www.calendarlive.com/galleriesandmuseums/cl-ask-knight012203,0,5291317.story?coll=cl%2Dart%2Dfeatures
Center for the Study of Political Graphics:
http://www.politicalgraphics.org/
The Anti-War Show
U.S. Interventions from Korea to Iraq
Curated by Carol Wells from the archives of the Center for the Study of Political Graphics.
The show runs thru February 15.
Track 16 - Bergamot Station
2525 Michigan Ave., Bldg C1, Santa Monica, CA 90404
Gallery Hours: Tue - Sat 11am-6pm
http://www.track16.com/
Robbie Conal:
http://www.robbieconal.com.
Thanx for listening!
dan
Daniel C. Tsang Host, Subversity, now Tuesdays, 4-5 p.m. KUCI, 88.9 FM and Web-cast live via http://kuci.org Subversity: http://kuci.org/~dtsang; E-mail: subversity@kuci.org Daniel Tsang, KUCI, PO Box 4362, Irvine CA 92616 UCI Tel: (949) 824-4978; UCI Fax: (949) 824-2700 UCI Office: 380 Main Library Member, National Writers Union (http://www.nwu.org) WWW News Resource Page: http://sun3.lib.uci.edu/~dtsang/netnews1.htm AWARE: http://sun3.lib.uci.edu/~dtsang/aware2.htm Personal Homepage: http://sun3.lib.uci.edu/~dtsang/