Growing up as a queer Black child in the Jim Crow era South, Ramekon O’Arwisters and his family had many barriers to overcome. His grandmother, recognizing that the young boy was “a bit of a hot mess,” one day called him over and invited him to work with her on her...
Ramekon O’Arwisters
Forrest Kirk “It Doesn’t Always Have to be Didactic”
“Art is on the frontlines of social change, challenging people’s core beliefs,” says artist Forrest Kirk, “and this is where I live in my work.” An exhibition of nine new paintings exploring the raised fist motif in his richly textured, chromatically charged...
Photographers of Democracy: Part 1 Mark Peterson and David Butow
“Democracy is never a thing done. Democracy is always something the nation must be doing.” – Archibald MacLeish Few contemporary American photographers have covered the endless living, breathing spectacle of democracy with more dedication and...
Joey Forsyte Our Vote is our Power
Joey Forsyte knows that “The only cure for grief is action.” Her beloved mother died shortly before Hilary Clinton lost the election for president. Overwhelmed by grief and loss, Forsyte was transformed into “a different person,” a person who—like her holocaust...
PROVENANCE Myth & Mural on Olvera Street
Tucked between two of the quaint brick and wooden structures comprising the colonial phantasmagoria that is LA’s Olvera Street, is a rooftop mural painted by the famed Mexican activist, Marxist organizer and painter, David Alfaro Siqueiros. The passion project of...
CODE ORANGE Winner and Finalists for Sept/Oct 2020
Congratulations to our winner Lane Barden and our finalists. Barden's photo is seen above and first in our photo gallery in the September/October online issue of Artillery. The following photographs are the finalists. Please see the info below on how to enter for our...
Kehinde Wiley Celebrates Black Identity Integrity 101
The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines the word “integrity” as a “firm adherence to a code of especially moral or artistic values, and the quality or state of being complete and undivided.” Integrity is not a learned value, and is not culturally determined, but...
The Role of Bad Art in a Democratic Society Decoder
An inevitable consequence of democracy, of equality, of freedom; of systems and technologies that more evenly distribute the power to influence the world; is the production and distribution of a tremendous amount of bad art. More of us learning means more of us know...
SIGHTS UNSCENE Pandemic Prelude
Art Brief Trump and the Triumph of Trash Culture
Donald Trump is a figure out of commedia dell’arte—a puffed-up clown who thinks he’s brilliant but is, in fact, an ignorant fool. His televised commentaries with the Coronavirus Task Force could have been uttered word-for-word by Il Dottore, the ridiculous “expert”...
Berlin’s Bundestag What Does it Mean for a Building to be ‘To the People?’
After German reunification the remains of the famously incinerated Reichstag were first Norman Fosterized, then draped by Christo and Jeanne-Claude, and finally repurposed as the Bundestag—the lower legislative body of German government roughly equivalent to the U.S....
Everything is Terrible! Bunker Vision
In July 2019 a new art space opened in Los Angeles. This wasn’t a neat minimal white cube for showing expensive art. At first glance one might be reminded of a vintage video store. If the space was on your radar, you would have probably noticed that it hosted...
Shoptalk: LA Art News R.I.P. Luchita Hurtado; COLA 2020 online; Carmen Argote's pandemic
COLA 2020 Sadly, so many art events, exhibitions, and performances have had to be canceled during Q time—too many to mention. Here I give a nod to the annual show for the COLA (City of LA) award winners from the previous year. They are each given $10,000 to create new...
Book Review: Set the Night on Fire "Set the Night on Fire: L.A. in the Sixties" By Mike Davis and Jon Wiener
In this passionate, lovingly detailed historical account of the struggle for social justice from multiple sectors of society in Los Angeles during an epic American decade, Mike Davis and Jon Wiener have written a history of activists who believed in democracy and...
COMICS Christo and His Bag
POEMS "The Swan Motel" By Alan Yuch; "Say You Love Me" By John Tottenham
The Swan Motel By Alan Yuch The hot nights, the swelter, even the walls would sweat. Sweet Marcy in the same cotton dress, patterned with red, white and blue balloons. The windowless room, matching walls, the air-flooded neon. This room was meant for sleeping,...
ASK BABS Should I Stay or Should I Go?
Dear Babs, If Trump gets another term in office I think I will leave the US. Where’s the best place to go for an artist who wants to flee America? —Expat Patty Dear Expat Patty, I remember getting a question like this back when Trump first came into office, so it...
Reconnoiter: Alison De La Cruz
Alison De La Cruz is a multidisciplinary theater artist, community-based facilitator, producer and cultural space cultivator who has spent over 20 years building intersectionally with Black, Latinx, Indigenous, queer and immigrant communities towards community-based...