#86 When the Morning Stars Threw Down Their Spears

... And Watered Heaven with their Tears
40x24  Cardboard, string, dirt, wood, acrylic on Masonite (already claimed

#175

#175 12x30 acrylic, string, sparkles on canvas

#131

Fusion. 25x25 Insulation board, stucco, fabric earing, newspaper, wood block, rusted metal, acrylic on Masonite. 

#60

fusion. 11,5x14  Kensington Winter. Wood strips, plastic, ginko leaves, glass fragments, dirt, ink and acrylic on paper on wood. (CLAIMED)

#19

14.5x12 assemblage

#43

Assemblage 12x8.5x3.5

#172

10.5x7.5 Pen & ink on paper, with Sante Fe dirt

#27

12.5x7 assemblage. Paper, rusted metal, leaf mounted on old photo album matt and Massonite

#40 Burning Man

Assemblage 24x17x8 

#61

14x11 Stuco flakes, acrylic on canvas

The Dirty Hippies who Cried Wolf!

Once upon a time a Constitutional Republic was taken over by wolves. The shepherds ran to the people and cried out, ''The woves have taken over the republic." The people looked in their closets, checked to see if there was food in the fridge, and turned on the TV... nothing there. "Stop crying wolf! Dirty Hippie sheperds!" so the sheperds went back to digging for real news--and low and behold, things were worse than they had been before! So they ran to the people and painted posters and camped in front of City Halls. "Wolves! The wolves had taken over our schools! The wolves are poisoning our water!" The people turned on Fox News... CNN, some even checked to see what their representatives were saying... nothing there. "Stop crying WOLF, dirty Hippies!" and turned their backs when the cops came and destroyed their camps and beat the shit out of some of them and pepper gassed them and threw them in jail, went into black neighborhoods to terrrify and beat the shit out of anyone they wanted. And those who hadn't given up, found that the Wolves had tapped their phones, were reading everyone's email. building prisons at record rates... and the shepherds came out on the street... a few here, a few there, and the people yawned, and watched TV. "There are no wolves here, Dirty Hippies. The Wolves all wear hijabs and robes and ride camels. We know how to get them when we see them. And they people all began to grow long bushy tails, and what big eyes they all had, looking out to report on their neighbors, and what big teeth they had! And when they were all wolves, no one could see what they had become. And that was the end America.

A Brief History of America in My Lifetime

When I was 10 years old in 1950, we moved from Chicago to Kansas City, and a few years later, out of the city into one of new developments—houses could be had for 10 to 12K, bought by recent graduates of colleges and law schools with the help of GI loans (if you were white). America was a beacon of freedom and opportunity… if you were white, employed with a living wage. Did not openly dissent and gain the ire of HUAC or the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of Government. Then you began to notice how many were--here, not abroad--were not included in that National Family Photo album. And then you began to realize that the abuses of power abroad were not shortcomings or errors, or inconsistent with national policy, but were systemic--and terrible for those caught up in our proxy wars and economic pillage. And then you began to see, as the Civil Rights Movement grew in strength, that poverty and racism and entrenched patriarchy here in  the U.S. were part of that systemic injustice everywhere, so when King began to connect the dots, it was no surprise that he was murdered. And when our proxy war in S.E. Asia was derailed by popular protest, it was no surprise that the predator class gathered ranks and decided there was too much 'democracy,' that the social movements of the 60's had to be demonized, unions--and every other effective form of popular civil resistance, destroyed, undermined or infiltrated and subverted, and with that--the media privatized and controlled. And when the Soviet Union collapsed under the weight of its own ineptitude and corruption, exhausted by our perpetual arms race--it was no surprise that our Empire of Money and Death would seize the opportunity to globalize its power, that the corporations--the oporational machines of the preditor class, would become the defacto government, and what was left of government, become a mere specticle. And Lo, it all came to pass as they had foreseen.

Language is Not Our Friend

I have a problematic relationship with words. They are--often the source--always an instrument of the worst of what we do to one another, and at the same time, our only means of finding our way out of the destructive maze they have created. It is so difficult to distinguish between their power to do us harm from their power to save us from ourselves. As though with fire--we could never quite remember or grasp the difference between using it to warm ourselves on winter afternoons and setting our bodies ablaze, and collectively--one might think there were a deep inclination or drive to favor the later over the former.

Snowden, for and against

Responses to Snowden mark a sharp line--on one side, supporters who believe we still have a legitimate governement and rule by law, and therefore, that it is possible in theory to betray it. On the other side, those who are convinced that the few left in government who are not bought and paid for by the preditor elite, are marginalized and irrelevant, that the State is concerned with NOTHING but preserving and protecting the power of that elite, that any benefits that acrue to the people are but means of keeping them pacified, therefore, there is no ethical or rational obligation not to undermine that utterly corrupted system in favor of returning to the people the right to know what is done in their name, and to create new relationships where people take control of their own lives and all collective action that effects them.

Beyond the Market: Art for perpetual Loan

Art for perpetual loan.  I will not sell my work.

Because art should be available to all, not primarily to the moneyed class.

Because an artist deserves material support, I am open to and encourage, but do not require, contributions, which can be one time donations, or on-going, to be worked out case by case.

Loans are perpetual. I ask only that you pledge never to sell or trade what you take for a profit. Art should never become a commodity and investment for the criminal class.

VIEW ALL POSTED WORK HERE, (scroll down) or make arrangements for a day-time tour of my studio.

We cannot defeat Capitalism, but we can replace it and make it obsolete.

My mother was 19 when she married, not 21 when I was torn from her body.  Seventy-two years. Child of water, seeker of oceans and lakes, it was no use; a single breath and my aquatic life was over. Drawn in my age to deserts (a suitable emblem of my sexual life), do I even remember how to swim? My mother would be 93. Seventeen years an orphan, hard to believe that she might well be alive,  By some accounts a Cancer, by some a twin (where is my other?) What is my life then, was her death. Soon there will be no one to remember. As a poet of my acquaintance wrote… “forgetting is what we do.”

#181

32x19 PVC, dirt, acrylic on Plywood

#182 America Devouring His Children

On Free Art

The problem of what do with my work has been a weight on my mind and spirit for months now. What I should do, if I listened to convention: get high quality photos, a nice portfolio, look for galleries that would like to give me a showing, hope that somewhere down the line, I might sell a few pieces, at the least—have some compensation for materials. If I worked hard at promotion, I might even claw my way a few notches up the art food chain. This depressed me on more levels than I can describe. I don’t want to be salesmen. I mean, I really don’t want, more than don’t want. The prospect of being an agent in the transformation of my work into commodities was making me sick. Emotionally and physically sick. Getting out of the Capitalist Womb is part of why I do this—why I want to make art. Contradicts everything else in my life, where and how I live, the people I choose to be with, the kind of world I want to live in. But an artist deserves to be paid for our work, I’m told, and how can I disagree?
 So I compare, ask people who know about these things, and see what kind of prices I should ask. You know how it goes—if you ask cheap, the “market” will peg you as cheap. If you believe in your work, you have to show that by the price you place on them. And if they sold, of course. If I could get them before the eyes of the “right” people, convince the “right” people… that is, people with money, if I were to be successful in this venture, I would be making (for me… who did not earn $50,000 life time earnings until my mid 40’s), rather decent money. and yes, this was not a small enticement... this was a very seductive prospect—and poison. Pure poison. Emotional evil fantasy poison to soul…
 On a material level, I’m running out places to put the pieces I make. I hang as many as I can around the Ox, in my room. But have begun to stack them against a wall in a store room. I’d begun to imagine destroying my work as I made it. A kind of Zen fantasy. But then—even before I put it those terms, I realized that what really was bothering me, was that no one could see them. The selling was important, but in a lesser way. Yeah, I’d like, and deserve, and la la la, but the real point of selling—is to make them visible! To send my children out into the world where they can live on their own terms. Not that compensation isn’t deserved, but that these are two different ends, and of the two—there can be no question, that the nightmare for me, was that I do this and no one sees them. Whether they like them or they don’t… critical approval… so much noise. That’s not my business—because I don’t OWN them… not what they are. And what are, will only happen as they become real for others.
 I wrote a post last night on FaceBook—and none this stuff was in my mind, not consciously—an impulse… made easier by a few glasses of wine. I thought—I’ll give them away. FREE ART. Such a sense of liberation. Even the next morning. Cold sober (would that all posts on such impulses ended this way!) Most of the thoughts above followed after.
And then I began to think about conditions. At first I thought—ok… if someone sells a piece, I can ask for some part of the sale. But no… I want to give them to others for their pleasure, not for some idea of future profit. Not even mine. But I can ask for contributions from those who can afford it, right? And if they do give pleasure—I can trust that will happen. So… a kind of indefinite loan. If you have a piece for a few months, and want a different one? Why not? A circulating loan. And for those who would like to help support this work, maybe an option of a monthly pledge, the amount determined solely by what that individual feels would be comfortable for them? So it’s not just art for the rich. And this offers… if I can keep making pieces, a real possibility of some modest compensation—which is all I could realistically hope for on the Art Market model—and they won’t be stacked up against a wall in a store room. And if the cops raid the Ox, and I’m disappeared in some secret rendition, they won’t all be taken and lost! (this is not paranoia. This American. If you don’t believe it. Wake up!) Not to go into this now… but these are not new ideas. I’ve thought of this kind of arrangement in terms of an artist’s collective. For artists who want to say FUCK CAPITALISM as much as I do, and yet—hope both for some compensation and to see their babies circulate in the world. Enough! Solidarity/Imagination/Resistance!

Willard Art -- FREE ART!

Click WILLARD ART for a selection of my visual art. If you are interested, and can't afford the suggested compensation, make me an offer. There are many more pieces here at the Ox. If you'd like to come for a viewing, left me know--any sunny afternoon!

I have no idea and less interest in what goes into marketing this stuff, and I'm running out of room to store it. So pick up some free art.  I want to keep track of any pieces taken. Should I want to have them in a show, I couuld borrow them back. Contributions to carry on the work, gratefully accepted, but not required or expected. Think of this as a free loan. They are not to be sold--they are for your pleasure, not your profit. I'll have a form to sign with these conditions.

#180

Acrylic on Plywood. 14.5x32

#93 Assemblage

Washing machine cover, roofing, latex house paint 27x24 $800

#150

26x22 Acrylic on Masonite $600

#90

Assemblage, 14x30. Stuco flakes, roofing paper, string, can lid,dirt, acrylic on wood.

#177

18x30 acrylic & oil pastel on plywood

#87 Assemblage

#162 New Mexico, Mirage Red River Rift

12x30 Acrylic, New Mexico dust on canvas. $600

#176

18x30 wood strips, dirt, sparkles, acrylic on plywood. $800

#169 "Remembering New Mexico"

36x18 Acrylic on Masonite

#174 Fusion

Acrylic & two stretched canvases mounted on plywood. 21x32 $1,800

#166

Assemblage. 24x48. Weathered steel cabinet door, roofing paper on composition board. $3000

#149 Fusion

25x23 string, fragments, acrylic on Masonite $800

#147 "Dream City"

Fusion. Roofing paper, plastic, string, acrylic on Masonite  22x23 $800

#136 Fusion

24x48 Roofing paper & acrylic on Masonite.

#77 "America"

Fusion 18x24 $2,400

#30 We Are What We Eat

Assemblage. 25x16 $2000

#12 Memorium

Asemblage. Auto fender fragment, 11x11x5 CLAIMED

#10 Piece of the Puzzle

9x14 Assemblage $300

No Revolution wihout Poetry, No Poetry without Revolution

#173 33x22 t-shirt from Guitarmy 99 mile walk, Philly to Zuccotti Park, acrylic on plywood

Photograph and create poster, and the original is yours

Beyond Non-Violence

I've come a long way from a belief in non-violence, though I was never an absolutist--siituation is everything--why I refused to accept a CO classification (pacificist) from my draft board--and ultumitally arrested for refusing induction) . This is not an easy admission--not for personal reasons, but because I know that the use of force is never in itself 'just'... in that, those who perish, are more likelly to be those who are not culpable (there are no 'innocents". Nenetheless.. I cannot but accept, however reluctant--that it must come to this if we are serious about changing this order--this Empire of Money and Death. And if I believe this--that I must be willing myself to take that on, that resposibility. We cannot remain pacificts. Though those who do--are not necessarily complicit.. we need them, too. As healers. As medics. As mediators. Let us not attack them. But thank them... not everyone can be on the front lines.. but those who are first of all, healers.. we must honor and respect.

When Resistance demands more than Non-Violance

I've come a long way from a belief in non-violence, though I was never an absolutist--siituation is everything--why I refused to accept a CO classification (pacificist) from my draft board--and ultumitally arrested for refusing induction) . This is not an easy admission--not for personal reasons, but because I know that the use of force is never in itself 'just'... in that, those who perish, are more likelly to be those who are not culpable (there are no 'innocents". Nenetheless.. I cannot but accept, however reluctant--that it must come to this if we are serious about changing this order--this Empire of Money and Death. And if I believe this--that I must be willing myself to take that on, that resposibility. We cannot remain pacificts. Though those who do--are not necessarily complicit.. we need them, too. As healers. As medics. As mediators. Let us not attack them. But thank them... not everyone can be on the front lines.. but those who are first of all, healers.. we must honor and respect.

Bradley Manning: Rally at Fort Meade

It was good to see what I'd guess were more than 1200 people outside the main gate of Fort George G. Meade, U.S. Army base, where Bradley Manning's court martial is being held, but the disproportionate number of older people--with almost half in their 50's or more, was perplexing. Where are those of Manning's own generation?

I was also a bit troubled--and this was likely my private feeling, and not a reflection on how seriously others took this rally--but I wasn't able to get into anything like a festive mood. When asked if I'd enjoyed the rally, I didn't know what to say. We marched in the heat, listened to speeches (none of which my ears were able to grasp), there was music. But there on the other side of that chainlink, barbed wire topped fence, with its WARNING signs and security guards kicking up dust as they sped past on their absurd, 4 wheel military golf carts--was a man in a cell. Three years with no trial. The decision--however many years are handed down, a fait accompli from the top echelons of our Empire of Money & Death. All those chants about 'freeing' him, so much rhetorical bluster. It was important to be there. Bradey Manning must not be forgetten, and those he threatens by the force of his naked conscience, have to know this, and be reminded again and again.

But I felt neither joy nor hope, and the opposite of powerful or effective. This might not be such a bad thing... that our actions should not require 'belief' in some all but supernatural efficacy of our success. We act because it is right. Because we must. Even when we aren't able to imagine anything close to success...