People, Places, & Things : Cravings | John Sheridan | The Money Sandwich
John Sheridan
Regular price
$3,500.00
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John Sheridan
The Money Sandwich
3"x12"x6", ink, posterboard, plastic
Capitalism’s great strides in productivity are not trickling down to the masses. On the contrary everything is more and more expensive all the time. People are squeezed by capital and ooze out the sides of this hyper competitive system as they are being crushed by money, like a melting ice cream sandwich.
Artist Statement
I am one of the only artists whose work is about life-and-death issues of Human Competition. Issues of Gun Violence, Racism, Sexism, Militarism and Money oppression are central to my work. The work begins with a conceptual art proposition (such as \"A head made of coins\") and utilizes found imagery, including reductive, mass-produced Action figures and objects as toy guns or other objects which in combination with the figures create a \'narrative\' or scenario - that can be understood by those with Ph.D.s in art history and equally well by children. Either by those who have spent their lives developing their taste or by those who come to the true appreciation of art naturally and spontaneously.
My own conscience is stricken and deeply disturbed and hurt by our insensitivity toward one another, to the point of allowing the taking of innocent lives through gun violence as seen every day, by people not having enough money to live dignified lives, by our continuing problems with racial oppression, our unequal treatment of women, the demonization of immigrants and asylum seekers, and by our support for gluttonish, wasteful, useless, endless genocidal proxy wars. These subjects are EXTREMELY UNUSUAL to be seen honestly in the arts. I know, I\'ve been a printmaker for over 1,000 artists and see many tens of thousands of works of art every year.
I am also an activist, having created the first ever - and still the only - Regional Art Prize in the Bay Area. The Sheridan Prize for Art is an annual online art prize and exhibition, open to ALL Bay Area artists at low to no cost (Incarcerated Artists and indigent artists participate free). As well as being open to all artists, a Free Speech Zone with NO GATEKEEPING (except for hate speech or patently illegal imagery) and with an emphasis in supporting traditionally marginalized artists, I offer a national record 78 awards every year to Bay Area artists. I know, so what. But still, it is the right thing to do so I am doing it.