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Dale Williams
"Starnosed Mole", acrylic painting, portrait, politics, poetry, humanity, resist

2019

$2,500
£1,896.94
€2,168.98
CA$3,491.82
A$3,882.43
CHF 2,027.19
MX$47,258.64
NOK 25,866.08
SEK 24,235.28
DKK 16,187.53
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About the Item

"Starnosed Mole" is an acrylic painting with litho ink and charcoal on paper, measuring 36" high by 24" wide. It is one of 50 portraits that comprise Profiles in Democracy. Savage in their execution, they are nevertheless heartfelt expressions from the artist – politically, socially, culturally – in some cases featuring text and language in the portrait. In this case, one individual musters faith and fortitude to press on, fight on. The words at top read: "Audacity – said the mole – shall root that mountain down." From Dale Williams: "Profiles in Democracy is a group of 50 portraits completed in 2019. They are an expression of sorrow at the fracturing ideals that our country now teeters upon. The portraits are mostly – not exclusively – imaginary: a populace viewed from the inside out, people that someone like our current president might call losers. They perhaps “live in gaudy poverty, powerful destitution,” to quote Osip Mandelstam’s poem included in my drawing of him – yet they endure. Exposed here are the bitter roots of art buried in the night soil of our politics." Press Release 2018: "Williams acknowledges a large range of influences on his vision: the moral lessons embodied in the works of 17th century engraver Jacques Lagniet, the darkling phantasms and tragic reportage of Goya’s Caprichos and Disasters of War, and the personal mythologizing of the late paintings of Philip Guston. Such works echo throughout Williams social surrealist re-visioning." – George Del Barrio, Vanderbilt Republic, Brooklyn NY Dale Williams has exhibited in the New York City area for the past 25 years. He is a 2014 recipient of a Fellowship in Printmaking/Drawing/Book Arts from the New York Foundation for the Arts. His most recent one-person show, “America Now Suite,” which re-visioned American history in service of the civic imagination, was held at Gowanus Loft, Brooklyn in October 2018. A selection of portraits from “America Now Suite” was included in the BRIC Biennial, Winter/Spring 2019. His portrait of Osip Mandelstam was included in the group show "Fresh Paint" at Art of Our Century Gallery, New York, February 2020. A show of drawings from his ongoing collaborative project with writer Ben Miller, “Cage Dies Bird Flies,” was held at the Center for Literary Arts of Cornell College in Mt. Vernon, Iowa, April 2019; a performance based on the drawings was staged to coincide with the exhibition. His work has been published in the Journal of Black Mountain College, BOMB, Ecotone, Inverted Syntax, Bat City Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review and other print and on-line journals. He studied art at the Cooper Union, Hunter College and Cal Arts.
  • Creator:
    Dale Williams
  • Creation Year:
    2019
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 36 in (91.44 cm)Width: 24 in (60.96 cm)
  • Medium:
  • Movement & Style:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
  • Gallery Location:
    Toronto, CA
  • Reference Number:
    1stDibs: LU134527304062

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"Human Welfare", acrylic painting, portrait, politics, Paris, humanity, resist
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