Las Gorras Blancas, Pete Yahnke
This People’s History poster commemorates the little known group, Las Gorras Blancas (White Caps). In the 1890’s, they actively cut fences and barbed wire that was being used to enclose and privatize common grazing lands in the Southwest U.S. The two-color offset printed poster, 11" x 17" (unsigned, unlimited edition) is available from Justseeds/Visual Resistance Artists’ Cooperative, a decentralized community of artists who believe in the power of personal expression in concert with collective action to transform society. www.justseeds.org

George Condo +
Thomas Kincade = Kitsch?

Written by Jenny Tango
to Art News Magazine
October 14, 2007

Dear Editor,
I recently had the opportunity to read your Summer 2007 issue and among its contents was an article about George Condo. I had just finished reading Ann Landi’s article in the same issue about the recent academic apotheosis of Thomas Kincade. I was struck how both Kincade and Condo are great examples of what Clement Greenberg called, “Kitsch”.

I can’t imagine how someone would relate Condo’s works to any of the Old Masters. Referencing several famous works in some corny way like his joke about Picasso’s Cubist portraits is strictly second-term high school foolishness. Condo’s slick figuration may put him one cut above Mall clown painters but his technique has nothing to do with the techniques of any of the Old Masters. Seriously! Relating Kincade to German Romantic painters? That is a laugh.

In the period of the robber barons, wealthy people realized that they were ignorant about art and chose knowledgeable art historians, connoisseurs, and informed art dealers to help them collect art. Today the nouveau riche think they know enough to make their own choices. They jump in helter-skelter secure in the notion that money procures credibility. With the large amounts of money involved however, money becomes valueless, so any crap becomes as good as the next crap. It is definitely the Bush Era of Art Collectors.

—Sincerely yours,
—Jenny Tango,
—Staten Island, NY

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