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War Room (Wally Hedrick)
Encyclopedia
The War Room by Wally Hedrick
(1928-2003), consists of eight canvases approximately 5 feet wide and 11 feet tall, all painted a deep black. Hedrick referred to these canvases as "wounded veterans". These canvases are bolted together to create a freestanding square room that could be entered via a small door in one of the canvases, thus creating an architectural painting. The black painted surfaces of the canvases face inward and the backs of the canvases face outward.
The War Room is an 'environmental' painting where the viewer enters a small enclosure of painted blackness. The viewer is left to consider the encompassing darkness and contemplate the vacuity that this space creates. Hedrick refused to ignore the war and instead created a work of cultural and political significance. After the Vietnam War ended he repainted these canvases black in protest of the Gulf War in 1992 and the Iraqi war in 2002.
During this time, Hedrick was accused of stealing paintings, including a canvas by Clyfford Still
, from the San Francisco Art Institute
, where he was teaching, then either painting them black or painting his own iconoclastic pictures over them.
The "War Room" is a significant item of Bay Area art history.
Wally Hedrick
Wally Bill Hedrick was a seminal American artist in the 1950s California counterculture, gallerist, and educator who came to prominence in the early 1960s...
(1928-2003), consists of eight canvases approximately 5 feet wide and 11 feet tall, all painted a deep black. Hedrick referred to these canvases as "wounded veterans". These canvases are bolted together to create a freestanding square room that could be entered via a small door in one of the canvases, thus creating an architectural painting. The black painted surfaces of the canvases face inward and the backs of the canvases face outward.
During this time, Hedrick was accused of stealing paintings, including a canvas by Clyfford Still
Clyfford Still
Clyfford Still was an American painter, and one of the leading figures of Abstract Expressionism.-Biography:...
, from the San Francisco Art Institute
San Francisco Art Institute
San Francisco Art Institute is a school of higher education in contemporary art with the main campus in the Russian Hill district of San Francisco, California. Its graduate center is in the Dogpatch neighborhood. The private, non-profit institution is accredited by WASC and is a member of the...
, where he was teaching, then either painting them black or painting his own iconoclastic pictures over them.
The "War Room" is a significant item of Bay Area art history.