Totally Woke: Williams College Museum of Art Promotes Lame Crayon Drawing as Significant American Art

WILLIAMSTOWN, MA - As a Sunday painter, I'm proud to announce that I'm starting to sell my paintings. Not for much, but enough to cover the cost of my art lessons. Along the way, I have developed an intense interest in traditional representational art and a commitment to restoring its pre-WWII glory. Accordingly, I'm a little sensitive when I see traditional American and European art being slowly suffocated in a thick cloud of noxious anti-white hatred. This hatred is on display at the formerly prestigious Williams College Museum of Art (WCMA) in their new show, SHIFT: New Interpretations of American and European Art, starting September 6, 2019.

There, the woke staff is fully cucked and convinced that a straightforward display of American and European Art - without genuflections to the evils of patriarchy and white supremacy - is probably the worst thing that could ever happen on Earth. A you can read on the notice above, the WCMA believes it is important to "be transparent about the ways the museum's collecting practices have helped to reinforce systems of power that privilege white men."

As such, the WCMA's commitment to wiping out white male privilege is consistent with the ill-treatment of young white students at the April 9, 2019 College Council meeting. There, as you may recall, white male students were the targets of an extended, bigoted, anti-white tirade at the hands of two black student activists affiliated with CARE Now. Neither of the blacks students was punished for their hates speech. One continued to serve on a hiring committee despite his obvious anti-white racism.

As far as I can tell, the museum staff believes the WCMA's collection of American and European Art is morally objectionable because a previous focus on collecting beautiful, skill-based visual art somehow prevented the collection of art from queers, blacks, and everyone else who didn't have training in skill-based visual arts. To make up for this historic sin, the WCMA's upcoming exhibition, The Shift: New Interpretations of American and European Art, seeks to atone for social injustice by placing extraordinary attention on works like the small crayon and pencil drawing below.

"Chee Foo, China," William O. Golding (American : 1875-1943),
1932, crayon and pencil mounted on board. Overall 8 7/8 x
12 3/16 in. Gift of Mrs. Mills B. Vane.

This example of affirmative action art is the creation of William O. Golding, a self-taught African American artist. I doubt the WCMA would feature it if it was drawn by a white adult...or even a white child. Golding produced about sixty drawings like this between 1932 and 1939 when he was near the end of his life and getting treatment as a patient at the U.S. Marine Hospital in Savannah, GA. Our appreciation for this crayola artist is supposed to be dependent on elements of his backstory including his involuntary introduction to working on ships and his visits to a large number of ports.

In every possible sense, however, Golding's work is the product of an untrained amateur. The artists shows no knowledge of color theory, perspective, or proportions. The key elements of the work are dull, cliche and boringly repetitive. The fact the WCMA would highlight an amateur crayon and pencil drawing like this demonstrates that it has lost all sense of artistic taste and expertise. Instead, it is going full on political ideology. This once prestigious institution is now, officially, a joke.

In response to their choice, I thought it would be fun to compare Golding's crayon and pencil drawing above with a simple plein air study I did this weekend up in Big Bear, CA.

"Big Bear Peak," John C. Drew (American 1957-), 
oil on canvas panel. Overall 11.5 x 8 in..

The most important point I would like to make is to say that if you look at my painting and blur your eyes you will notice that the sky and the foreground look surprisingly realistic. That, dear reader, is one of the most important standards used to judge high quality representational art. As they say, I managed to accurately captured the light.

Typical for plein air painting, I spent about two and a half hours on this painting. I did it alla prima which is just a fancy way of saying I did it all at once while all the paint was still wet. Painting later on to correct errors may actually damage a painting like this because the paint is no longer fresh and the vitality of the moment has been lost. This painting, one of my best, is the result of about five years of practice under the tutelage of two of the finest representational artists in the State of California, Ebrahim Amin and Peter Adams. In this context, my painting is a relevant example of traditional, skill-based visual art or, as I like to say, the core values of Western Civilization.

My increased skill level is getting me greater attention. I sold five similar pieces to collectors over the last month.

Perhaps someday my "Big Bear Peak" plein air painting will be purchased by the WCAM. Following their current ideology, they could interpret my painting anew by understanding it in the context of my painful backstory including the way I persisted in developing my talent despite my poverty as a child and young adult, elite social rejection, and the institutionalized racial discrimination I faced at the hands of both Williams College and the U.S. Supreme Court.

I hope whoever sells this painting to the WCAM gets an exorbitant amount of money for it. They will deserve it as a reward for their uncanny ability to invest in high quality, truly courageous and significant art.

John C. Drew, Ph.D. is an award-winning political scientist and a former Williams College professor. He is an occasional contributor at American Thinker, Breitbart, Front Page, PJMedia and WND.

Gag Me with Abstract Art: Thoughts on Williams College Museum of Art

WILLIAMSTOWN, MA - The Williams College Museum of Art (WCMA) spent yesterday promoting its new database for its art collection. The results seem spectacular and they are inviting others to leverage the database for their own research and examination. Personally, I don't remember even visiting the collection while I taught at Williams. I visited the Clark a lot (and eventually found it repetitive and boring) but never bothered with the on-campus museum.

Now, however, it looks like they are doing a lot more at WCMA to make the collection significant in the life of the college. According to a press release they even have a program where you can hang a work from the museum in your own dorm room. I would have loved to look through the collection and find a piece to put over my fireplace on Southworth Street. Here's an overview of some of the WCMA's outreach programs:

WCMA uses its collection in amazing ways. It’s an academic museum, and the collection is meant to be a key part of learning across disciplines. In Object Lab, faculty select works of art that become lenses for classes to explore neuroscience, or botany, or religion. Collection objects are loaned to students through WALLS, encouraging long-term personal connections. The Rose Object Classroom allows artworks to be used in a classroom space. WCMA’s Reading Room encourages timely public conversation around individual works of art.

My pro-tip for conservative students is to simply ignore abstract art and modernism. It is, in my view, silly and a waste of time. I'm a member of the California Art Club. I like to think of myself as a contemporary plein air, representational artist. I know from personal experience that it is not easy to learn the skill-based visual arts. In the famous atelier system, for example, a student may spend years working up the ladder learning to draw in charcoal, paint in black and white, and eventually use a broader pallet. The more you know about representational art, the more fascinating it becomes.