Mateo is not a criminal
As I worked on this and the other pieces in this series I wondered if any gallery would want to exhibit them. This work is a direct criticism of the president, and he’s doing his best to make people afraid to criticize him.
In his first 100 days in power the president has gone after everyone who’s ever made him mad. When he doesn’t attack people or institutions directly he mentions something online and his most rabid fans do his dirty work. When judges rule against him, for example, they and their families get hundreds of threatening emails and phone calls.
In this political atmosphere many people and institutions are trying to avoid any confrontation with the administration. That’s a common reaction to a bully – keep your head down and hope he doesn’t notice you. Even if the bully targets you the temptation is not to complain because he could always make it worse.
That’s why I wasn’t sure if this work would be exhibited. But I applied to ArtPrize anyway. That’s a huge art competition and festival held in Grand Rapids annually. This year it will run from September 18 to October 4. Over 800,000 people come to ArtPrize each year.
Within days of applying I got an email from one of the 149 participating venues inviting me to exhibit. Last weekend I drove to Grand Rapids to make sure that the owner of the business where I’d been invited to exhibit was fully on board with work that was political. He told me he didn’t see my art as political, and he himself never gets involved in politics. He sees what is being done to these children and their parents as a human rights issue. To him my work was about human rights, not politics.
So the work will be seen in Michigan this fall. Now I need to finish the work, and find more places where someone likes the art and is not worried about irritating the president and his most rabid fans.
