Dear Reader,

The sun is sinking slowly outside my window as I sit at my desk with my trusty old cur by my side. I can feel the cool evening breeze and the quietude is almost alarming. This is a milestone for Artillery’s 13 years in publication: We put all our content on the web (as we always do), but this time there won’t be an accompanying print edition.

It’s a little sad and touching, as I re-read all the stories—hoping to catch more typos—featured by Artillery’s loyal contributors are so heartwarming, thoughtful and written with care and emotion—mostly for gratis. All our contributors chipped in, wanting to ensure that Artillery stays alive.

There is no May/June print edition as we are not a nonprofit magazine and depend on advertisers for revenue. For obvious reasons, galleries and museums have closed their doors, so there’s nothing to draw attention to or advertise. However, artists continue to make art and galleries are still showing the art, albeit online, and that’s the reality of the situation. So the art world still exists, but in a different way, and we are here to document it.

In this special “Artillery at Home” online edition, we decided that we didn’t want all the stories to be about COVID-19, but for the articles to capture a certain time and place. There’s a war going on, and that just can’t be ignored. So our contributors put on their thinking caps and came up with some wonderful and relevant things to read.

Writer Julie Schulte profiles Hayley Barker, our “cover” artist, whose recent paintings accidentally fit the current times. Contagion aside, her paintings explore women in repose and address many issues we are experiencing in the Age of Corona. Her vibrant “radioactive” paintings ooze contemplation, trauma and healing.

Columnist Anthony Ausgang critiques rock art. “Why not,” he says. I agree, does everything have to be profound, deep, soul-searching? Of course not, and we provide plenty of much needed distraction in this issue. But regular columnist and artist Zak Smith advises artists to not just stop everything and start making decorative masks. He points out that the greatest art doesn’t always reflect current events.

I know that when I finally get into my studio to resume making art, that my subjects (I tend to do portraiture) won’t be wearing masks. In our art history books during this century, there will be many subjects with gloves, masks and full-on hazmat suits. We can always rely on art to imitate life, but these times might also see a return to representational work with flowers and bees (what are those?), still lifes, landscapes and nudes frolicking in meadows. That kind of art might represent our longing for companionship and the human touch. How does that corny Streisand song go? People…people who need people…

The sun has now sunk below the horizon. It was one of those big bright orange balls, dropping beyond the ocean. I got up out of my chair to watch it disappear. Maybe that’s what I’ll paint. I’ll paint the beautiful sunset.