Williams, Robert

The Lowbrow Art of Robert Williams

San Francisco, CA: Last Gasp Press, San Francisco, CA. Limited First Edition. Hardcover. Signed by Robert Williams. “In asking Robert Williams (b. 1943) to name his favorite artist of all time, you might expect him to pick out someone like Hieronymus Bosch, whose colorful tableaux of demons and mechanical devices bear a certain resemblance to Williams’ own work….Instead, Williams chooses the mild-mannered Catalan architect Antonio Gaudi (1852-1926), whose neo-gothic Art Nouveau buildings are sprinkled throughout Barcelona and the surrounding countryside. Most Americans, if they have heard of Gaudi at all, regard his work as eccentric and absurd. Gaudi’s work has been totally ignored, even suppressed…the typical reason given being that it is ‘not serious.’ Huge, curving buildings with undulating facades and no two windows alike! Big bulbous chimneys all covered with brightly-colored ceramics! Broken bottles, chinaware, and dolls’ heads pasted to the ceilings, and giant stone snails crawling up the walls! ….Robert sees him more like a general. One of those monocled Junker generals with a spiked helmet and his army of artist-soldiers in the Prussian military tradition of Kadavergehorsham, which means ‘corpselike obedience,’ all of which might sound like a very artistic concept at first, but a person has to have some sort of positive attitude toward discipline if he’s going to sit in front of an easel eight hours a day, working on the same painting for a year and a half, wouldn’t you think?” (Abridged from Introduction). Excepting only the massive, coffee-table Art Book “Malicious Resplendence,” “The Lowbrow Art of Robt. Williams” is the single best art book ever published on Williams. In comparison to the Viking Feast that is “Malicious Resplendence,” this is a series of Spanish “tapas,” — a much slimmer work, indeed. However, the presence of resplendence is here, announcing itself unashamedly. The work boasts new, gorgeous reproductions of Williams’ “Big Hits,” like 1968’s “In the Land of Retinal Delights” & “Ernestine and the Venus of Polyethylene,” as well as “Deep Cuts” like “Psychic Pedestrians on a Spiral Horizon (Barycenter).” What helps this work go “above-&-beyond,” however is the accompanying text (by Robert Williams & Gilbert Shelton) unfurled in “chapters” which introduce and accompany the art. All considered, this is the “go-to” volume for would-be initiates into the world of Williams, and a must-have for devotees (such as your Devoted Managing Curator), alike. [ISBN: 978-0-86719-890-4]. Hardcover in illustrated boards: a Limited First Edition; one of 500 copies, as noted on copyright page. This copy is additionally signed by the sui generis, California comix artist on custom, center-aligned rectangular bookplate present on recto of illustrated FFEP. Williams’ signature, in bold, black felt pen ink, reads: “Robert Williams.” Book in pronouncedly very fine condition, quite deserving of the “as new” designation we’ve afforded it here. As New. [Item #5108]

Price: $90.00