MARK WILLIAMS CRITIQUES THE INTRODUCTION OF MILITARISM TO YOUNG CHILDREN

untitled (yellow bunny), 2010,
acrylic on canvas, 38 x 34 inches

Opening Reception
Thursday, January 19, 2012 | 6-8 PM
Part of Creative Cocktail Hour
$10/$5 Real Art Ways Members
Exhibition through Sunday, April 1, 2012

Hartford, Connecticut - Real Art Ways presents The War is Over, an exhibition of brightly colored work by Mark Williams, who critiques in the form of toy soldiers, the introduction of militarism to young children.

His paintings are bright candy colored portraits of toy soldiers posed in combat - standing, crouching and with guns out stretched. Large playful forms inspired by objects made from Play-Doh obscure and smother the soldiers. In Untitled (Yellow Bunny), 2010, an immense, smiling, and doughy bunny, holding a giant carrot, conceals a soldier loading a rocket.

Williams began creating paintings, prints, and sculptures for this series shortly after the United States went to war with Iraq for the second time.

Williams says, "The fact that there are toys of men holding guns, toys about war, about death, and murder for children at an early age interests me immensely.”

About Mark Williams
Williams received his MFA from the University of Connecticut. Mark has worked for the artist Sol LeWitt, was awarded a full fellowship from the Vermont Studio Center as well as an artist fellowship grant from the Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism. He has exhibited his artwork throughout North America and is in public and private collections including The Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford.  Mark lives and works in New Haven and teaches art at Three Rivers Community College. 

Also in the Galleries

Blake Shirley: Skull Couch, on view through Sunday, February 12 Blake Shirley explores the disparate and fragmented nature of memory.

Poster Boy: Street Alchemy 2.0 is on view through Sunday, January 30. Armed with a razor blade, Poster Boy manipulates vinyl advertisements to create startling, harsh or even humorous mash-ups. The works for Street Alchemy 2.0 were originally designed for an exhibition at Trinity College.

Support
This exhibition was made possible with the generous support of Real Art Ways Members, Sandy and Howard Fromson, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development, Lincoln Financial Group, Travelers and Greater Hartford Arts Council's United Arts Campaign.

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