I’m coming to the end of a raft of paintings that will hopefully mark the end (for the immediate time at least) of the Icarus series. The reason behind the Icarus theme was tied to the UK and US illegal intervention in Afghanistan and Iraq; it seemed an appropriate allegorical reference for the hubristic aspirations of George Bush and Tony Blair in their deranged hopes to rewrite Middle East politics in the fashion of western sensibilities. These last paintings have been a long time finishing and a lot have been discarded or painted over on the journey but now they seem to be approaching their natural end.
As I’m writing this the news stations are declaring that tomorrow Bush will probably announce an increase of perhaps twenty thousand extra troops to perform, on his behalf, some bizarre final curtain call prior to an eventual withdrawal. The American Democrats are calling for the withdrawal, as are the American electorate – but this warmonger’s arrogance will probably not allow him to accept the ‘will of the people’. Like Tony Blair he is obsessed with his historical legacy. Well it doesn’t take a huge capacity for depth of political and historical analysis to know that their legacy will eventually (because God knows there are enough media apologists for this fiasco and blood-bath) be that they took two nations into an illegal war with the expectation of installing a government that would support western economic oil greed.
As well as this I’ve read today in the New Statesman that the UK and US military are putting money into constructing ‘ecologically sound’ weaponry. Bullets without lead – because it’s potentially bad for the water table when the rounds settle in the dirt after they’ve blown off the limb of the soldier they’ve killed, and rockets that launch with less smoke – to reduce any contribution to air pollution after they’ve blown the crap out of an innocent family’s home (acceptable collateral losses).
It’s not even April 1st, the world is fucked up and we’re all probably going to hell in the proverbial hand cart. And people have the nerve to accuse artists of talking irrelevant nonsense.
I’ve said it before but I’ll say it again. Tony Blair stated that God would be his judge – well if that’s what you honestly believe and you honestly have faith, then be careful what you wish for you mad bastard.
“Our leaders lie”
guydenning.org 