Extending the Legacy: The Political Art of Ian White

 

Many American art historians, critics, and laypersons know of the powerful influence of Charles White, one of the premier African American artists of the 20th century. Thousands of appreciative viewers have been moved by his murals, paintings, and prints. White spent his entire career promoting a critical vision highlighting the struggles and poorly-recognized accomplishments of his people. His images of dignity and protest have inspired a younger generation of visual artists of all ethnicities to continue in his path by adding their own unique contributions to the long tradition of artistic resistance.

An especially obvious example of Charles White's impact can be found in the life and work of his adopted son, Ian White. A gifted and accomplished young artist, Ian White joins his late father in his commitment to socially conscious art. He has added several stylistic innovations in his own work, all the while focusing on some of the major social and political themes of the 1990s.

From early childhood to the present, Ian White has been exposed to a variety of artistic and political influences that inform his present work as an emerging front-rank political artist. His travels in early adulthood solidified his activist political stance. His experiences in Central America, especially in Nicaragua during the Sandinista era, informed him about major contemporary political struggles, encouraging him to use his art as a weapon in those struggles. His contact with the political billboards and murals of those times (now, regrettably, obliterated by the American-sponsored conservative regime in that land) stimulated him to produce comparable artistic work in his own country.

Equally important, he has been influenced by some of the giant figures of socially conscious art. He recalls, for example, the powerful impact of reading Ben Shahn's the Shape of Content, a book that eloquently defends the proud heritage of social dissent in the arts. He sees his own efforts as following the example of such major political artists as Kathe Kollwitz, Diego Rivera, Jose Clemente Orozco, and David Alfaro Siqueiros.

Among contemporary artists, he acknowledges the influence of Sue Coe, John Biggers, and David Hammons. Significantly, Biggers and Hammons are outstanding and highly visible representatives of the long tradition of African American resistance art. Hammons was a student of Charles White at the Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles during the 1960s. Ian White, although of both Chinese and African American biological origin, identifies himself as an African American, and sees himself as extending that legacy.

Ian White was trained formally in the fine arts, receiving his BFA at the San Francisco Art Institute, where he had, among others, Angela Davis as a teacher. Recently, he completed his MFA degree at the Otis Art Institute.

White's artwork combines a variety of forms with incisive social commentary. Using traditional paintings, murals, and mixed media installations, he has produced an impressive body of artwork about the controversial issues of the late 20th century. In an untitled oil and acrylic painting from 1990 (Figure 1), for example, he uses a solitary figure whose expression reveals a powerful sense of anguish or despair. Psychologically perceptive, the work communicates an understanding of the boy's inner turmoil. On one level, the painting expresses a universal feeling of emotional pain.

The meaning of the work transcends the realm of individual psychology to convey the savage emotional consequences of confronting the hostile social and economic environment for black males. The subject's facial expression reveals the familiar understanding that by virtually every standard--mortality, health, education, employment, and income--African American men fare poorly. The figure's face suggests the sorrow of knowing young friends who have died or been incarcerated.

This painting, however, has a double meaning. The young man, facing powerful obstacles, is determined to prevail despite all odds. White's effort, created with deliberate ambiguity, encourages viewers to understand both the horrific conditions of contemporary black men and to applaud their remarkable resilience in responding to these conditions.

In "I Have A Dream--Reality" (Figure 2), a young African American boy gazes suspiciously at the image of the U.S. capitol in Washington, DC as he comprehends the immense gap between the promises of the government and the far grimmer reality. The credit card metaphor expresses dramatically what African Americans citizens have known since the Civil War. Despite some modest if grudging advances, and despite the anti-racist rhetoric of governmental officials for many decades, a truly adequate pay-off for centuries of egregious racism is still forthcoming. Like his older contemporaries, the boy seeks appropriate compensation, paid at least at the same interest rate that consumers encounter with VISA and American Express.

In "DC Railroaded" (Figure 3), White uses a Monopoly-like image to chronicle the human and animal displacement caused by 19th century westward expansion. Countering the romanticized version of the expansion found in the conventional media and in school textbooks, the painting encourages viewers to understand the fundamental and destructive displacement of that era. The Santa Fe Railroad, represented in a side view at the top and in a front view in the center of the composition, symbolizes the predatory commercial development that displaced Native Americans from their villages and the bison population from their land.

In his mural "Genocidal Tendencies" (Figure 4), White addresses the continuing problem of nuclear catastrophe. Once again, his focus on a young boy enables audiences to personalize the dangers of a nuclear accident. The three silos at the left of the mural are an ominous presence, an appropriate reminder of the tragedies of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. White intensifies his warning about atomic energy's destructive potential by painting a border of circled covered wagons, a pointed reference to the historical genocide committed against American Indians. In the present setting, the wagons represent an absurdly outmoded "defense" against the risks of nuclear power plant accidents. By juxtaposing 19th century images against a late 20th century technological danger, he underscores the seriousness of the threat to human health and life. The circled wagons suggest a precarious sense of false security, mirroring a widespread public attitude in the United States and other nations employing nuclear power as an energy source.

White used his work to criticize President George Bush's Gulf War of 1991. His mixed media sculpture entitled "New World Bowl Vet" (Figure 5) denounces the superficial patriotism that dominated American consciousness during the saturation bombing of Iraq. The artist emphasizes a camouflaged-covered football helmet at the top of the sculpture, sardonically revealing the simplistic win/lose ambiance of most public discourse during the Gulf War. A closer glimpse, however, shows a human skull beneath the helmet.

His "Go With The Spirit" (Figure 6) acrylic painting focuses on the Iraqi women victims at the top left. Virtually ignored by the American mass media, untold thousands of Iraqi soldiers and civilians perished, the vast majority of whom were hardly zealots defending Saddam Hussein. The women survivors are left to deal with the grief and hardship of their losses. The gas pump at the right and the rising symbol of Union 76 at the bottom left suggests that oil interests remain the dominant reason for American involvement in the Persian Gulf.

In recent years, Ian White has embarked on a variety of more public art forms. One of his most imaginative efforts is the 1993 installation entitled "25 Will Get You 25: Read 'Em And Weep" (Figure 7). Repainting a standard vending machine for children found in most American supermarkets, he transformed the instrument from a mildly innocuous revenue producer to a forum for education and social criticism. White has inserted eight different plastic guns in containers, each with a printed message providing statistics about violence, crime, and guns, especially in African American communities. Some of the plastic containers have miniature handcuffs, the 20th century symbol of slave-era shackles.

In 1994, the artist executed a "guerrilla" artwork when he installed a site-specific mural (Figure 8) on a retaining wall on Forest Lawn Drive in North Hollywood. This road is located near the Gene Autry Western Heritage Museum, Travel Town, and Forest Lawn Memorial Park and Mortuary. The mural depicts three real estate signs with the names of these three attractions. The images below the text contain a combination of the Native American cosmos shield and the West African mandala.

As White explains in a news release accompanying this guerrilla effort, the Autry Museum romanticizes the Western frontier and trivializes Native Americans' contributions to frontier development. Travel Town honors American railroad history without revealing any of the detrimental human and environmental consequences of this history. Forest Lawn Cemetery, a well known tourist site in Los Angeles, is an example of a European burial ground that receives uncritical attention and unconditional protection.

Only 30 years old, Ian White has already established a notable record of effective political art. His recent efforts suggest an increasing sense of scale and complexity, particularly his public projects that involve substantial audience participation. A fine representative of the growing community of Los Angeles-based African American artists, his unique vision continues the struggle against the various injustices of modern society. <B><U>Z<D>

I gratefully acknowledge the support of the UCLA Institute of American Cultures and the Center for African American Studies in providing support for this article.