My Sculptural Gift to the GOP (Part 1)

(7:30PM EST – promoted by Nightprowlkitty)

Thanks to nightprowlkitty for telling me about this very cool site. I’m pleased to meet you all and to share my current project. I’m a fine artist working primarily in mixed media sculpture right now. I’m about to have my first solo show of extremely political artwork. I’ve been pre-exhibiting the work online because most folks won’t have a chance to see the work in person. I’m happy to share it with you on nightprowlkitty’s suggestion. Here is the first installment:

Cross Posted at Elephant in the Room (Go there for larger views of images if you wish.)

I’m an artist first and a political blogger second. Sometimes, especially in the past eight years (youknowwhy) I’ve had to put my art second, behind my activism, which I don’t like to do. Other times having art-making as an expressive outlet has probably kept my head from exploding. Like you poll wonks, and policy writers I’m using my personal skills to help win our country back. Art is a less represented method of activism here on DailyKos but there are many artists among our community.

I’d like to share with you the first in a series of sculptures I’ve been working on since 2003. The actual artwork will be on exhibit in October (near one of the nation’s largest Marine bases) but since most of you won’t be able to get to Joshua Tree, CA to see it, I’m sharing it online now. I’m hoping it will help change votes, minds, hearts, and inspire progressive action and CHANGE/HOPE/PROGRESS!

With Us or Agin’ Us ©2008 Emily Duffy

Dimensions: 52″x24″x36″

Hanging globe on flagpole. (Started in 2003)

Materials: USSR-era paper globe with maps of Texas cover all major land masses, wooden flag pole covered with news headlines about Iraq, noose made out of American flag material, and a metal flag holder.

This, the first piece in my Elephant in the Room series was inspired by George W. Bush’s statement to so-called “coalition partners” (aka “Coalition of the Willing”), “You’re either with us or against us.” – November 6, 2001

A coalition partner must do more than just express sympathy, a coalition partner must perform,” Bush said. “That means different things for different nations. Some nations don’t want to contribute troops and we understand that. Other nations can contribute intelligence-sharing. … But all nations, if they want to fight terror, must do something.”

Bush said he would not point out any specific countries in his speech.

“Over time it’s going to be important for nations to know they will be held accountable for inactivity,” he said. “You’re either with us or against us in the fight against terror.”

With Us or Agin’ Us – Detail of Africa ©2008 Emily Duffy

Bush said threats by Osama bin Laden to use weapons of mass destruction must be taken seriously. “This is an evil man that we’re dealing with, and I wouldn’t put it past him to develop evil weapons to try to harm civilization as we know it,” Bush said. ” And that’s why we must prevail, and that’s why we must win.” – Source

With Us or Agin’ Us – Detail of the Americas ©2008 Emily Duffy

This statement, and hundreds more than followed it out of George W. Bush’s mouth, showed how he is bully who insists on categorizing complex political issues into black-and-white sound bytes. Unfortunately he was able to use past credibility of our country, and mountains of cash, to convince the reluctant “coalition of the willing“.

With Us or Agin’ Us – Detail of the flagpole (Fallujah) ©2008 Emily Duffy

The thought that came to my mind was that Bush was trying to turn the entire world into annexes of Texas and that by leveraging our previous goodwill with the world he had the entire globe in a stranglehold. Therefore the sculpture, has every major landmass covered with maps of Texas and the globe is hanging by a noose made from American flag fabric.

With Us or Agin’ Us – Detail of Asia & Europe ©2008 Emily Duffy

This was all just fine for an American populace at the time who was more interested in living the good life than paying any attention to current events. Now, however, that has thankfully changed. Americans in record numbers are becoming politically active and the recent Democratic and Republican conventions drew record television viewership. An informed, educated, and angry public is very bad for the GOP’s right wing agenda.

With Us or Agin’ Us – Detail of Australia ©2008 Emily Duffy

NOTE: You’re welcome to share my artwork and comments with anyone you think might appreciate them. But I ask that you give proper credit of these copyrighted works and link them back to this blog. None of this artwork may be used by others for profit of any kind.

Please help spread the link to this blog everywhere you can. This artwork was created for the purpose of making Americans think carefully about the kind of country they want this to be when they vote on November 4, 2008. Do they want a continuation of 8 years of fear, war, division, hate, economic drain, isolationism, and denial of science, climate change, and basic reality? If not, they need to vote for, support, donate to, and cover the back of the Democratic candidate, Barack Obama.