Category Archives: Artillery Magazine articles

There is a force in Hopper’s paintings that is fierce and unrelenting in its desire to reveal the truth. It is not the people or the buildings of New York, it is the light and the way in which it … Continue reading→

Pop Art brought the image back from the grave where Abstract Art had dumped it, but it was not the same image, instead of man and his tiresome worries about his soul and his desires, it was the image of … Continue reading→

When I go to New York I stay with a friend who loves the opera and we go to whatever is playing at Lincoln Center. We go early so he can walk through the park and so I can visit … Continue reading→

Can beauty or aesthetic pleasure portray the inhumanities of man? The answer is, of course, yes— Guernica, by Picasso. But can art go further? Can she be political and still maintain her cloak of beauty besmirched by the muck of … Continue reading→

He’s not German but he is the father of German Expressionism. He was considered mad, due to the popular belief that artistic talent was heightened by illness and despair, rather than the courage to look into the darkness that other … Continue reading→

Henrietta shore was one of LA’s early moderns. She broke away from the scenic painters of nature, to concentrate on a single plant or tree or leaf. This was a giant step at the time: to paint a simple plant … Continue reading→

I’m not sure that Andy Warhol was thinking of branding when he decided to turn himself into an art star. He was probably thinking of Jackson Pollack who became the leading Abstract Expressionist because he had the Macho charismatic personality … Continue reading→

Most conceptual art is lacking in emotion but this is not the case with Murakami. The suppressed anger, vicious comeback, and intense empathy are inescapable. I know I feel humiliated sitting in a child’s plastic chair, eating a poison Big … Continue reading→

If it were just a beautiful landscape, I wouldn’t be drawn to it so strongly. Thank god it is not. The beauty of this painting is like a golden dress whose wearer is none other than our old friend fear, … Continue reading→

If you live in California, once you see the mountains in Landacre’s wood engravings you are suddenly home, a place that yanks at your heart no matter how much you hate it here. These are the hills you see every … Continue reading→

I cannot look at this painting without thinking it is an unintentional portrait of the artist’s subconscious. As in a dream, all the characters are Moreau; he is the half dead king Herod trapped in a fantasy Hindu castle, as … Continue reading→

It’s freezing in New York. I’m staying at the Gershwin, a mid-town hotel with imagination and rooms straight out of Raymond Chandler. This week they are having a Warhol festival, everyone gets a free silver wig and a pair of … Continue reading→