Java.Oct.2017

Long before artist Robert Williams founded Juxtapoz magazine, the printed paradise of
underground and outside-the-box artwork that debuted in 1994, he was creating bombastic,
original artwork that forged the direct pathway to that publication’s birth. Slang Aesthetics!
is a touring exhibition featuring a selection of his oil paintings, drawings and immoderate
sculptures that is currently viewable at Mesa Contemporary Arts Museum through January 21, 2018.
While Williams and his wife, Suzanne—herself a talented artist—were here earlier this month for the
opening reception and related events, tragedy struck back in California. Williams’ dear friend, and
a member of the team responsible for the creation and development of Juxtapoz, Greg Escalante
passed away at 62. The gregarious and generous gallery owner, collector and longtime supporter of
the arts took his own life, after years of battling mental conflict and turbulence. It is a tremendous
loss that has leveled the arts community. “It’s such a very sad and unfortunate happening,” said
Williams, adding, “The vacuum that he’s going to leave will be huge in the months to come. He was so
charitable and organized. He helped so many people, especially young artists.”
The depths of Escalante’s inner turmoil came as a surprise to many, even dear friends like Williams. “He
was a very close friend of mine. As I look back, maybe I could have been more sympathetic to him,” said
Williams, “but I do come from a nastier world, and at the time, I didn’t realize how emotionally embroiled
he was by the devils that continually worked on him.” Escalante was always known for being happy go
lucky, but Williams said that he got more of a view of Escalante’s troubles in the very recent weeks
before his death.
That “nastier place” Williams himself came from includes what he calls a “very difficult” childhood
and teenage years that were loaded with unhappiness. He was thrown out of schools, did jail time and
bopped around from job to job. He got a firm
understanding of what hard work was and what
it meant to succeed and decided to implement
that knowledge fiercely when he became an
artist. “When I made the decision early in life to
be an artist,” he said, “I realized that very few
people succeed, and I knew I had to do it.”
He wasn’t entertaining other possibilities as
options. “The art community is a very sensitive,
caring, delicate world, and I come from a rough,
brutal world where the chances of surviving are
very tough. I saw the alternatives and I knew I
had to make it as an artist.” Even with his view
of the art world’s sensitive side, he didn’t kid
himself for a minute about the challenges that
come with exploring that landscape and hoping
for exceptional results. “Everyone can be an
artist, but only about three or four percent can
be professional artists that make a living at it.
It’s a ridiculous percentage—it’s brutal!”
Williams left Albuquerque for art school in
Los Angeles in 1963, armed with fantasies of
comic book art and pulp magazines and other
inspirational imagery, only to land in art school
during the heyday of abstract expressionism,
where his lean toward bold and imaginative
realistic works was stifled. Fluent in art
history, Williams understood the why’s of what
was being taught at the time, he just didn’t
appreciate how abstract work seemed to foster
a devaluation of representational art.
“I don’t really favor impressionism and abstract
expressionism. I understand the theories and
the backbone, and it’s of course legitimate—
there’s no bad art—there’s just been a
complete denial of representational art.” He
sees that changing, now that there are younger
generations not being raised on abstract
expressionism and conceptualism, but back
then, he recalls, “It was omnipresent, it was
fucking everywhere, and it was a law.”
He thought pop art might be a pathway toward
highlighting the beauty of realistic work, but
those hopes didn’t last long. “The problem with
pop art,” he says, “is that it is appropriating.
It’s not really a free use of the imagination or a
way to exercise the imagination. It’s just simply
referencing things in your everyday life. If you
consider that realistic work, I can’t argue with
you, but it’s certainly inhibiting.”
JAVA 35
MAGAZINE