Marx Babysitter of Revolution

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In Cody Books in Berkeley you could buy little books written by the Viet Cong these publications were intended to find new comrades and cadre. I remember by friend Steve (special forces) saying that these books were all propaganda and I thought this freedom of the press is a great concept. Indeed freedom of the press is very important for artists' The Artpolice Journal was very much a free speech vehicle. Thousands of pages of ArtpoliceĀ  appeared over 20 years.Aside from the regular offices we had in Los Angeles, Chicago,New York and New Jersey, San Antonio, San Francisco, Toronto we had drops in Finland, London, Paris, on and on we simply took the shape of our contributors and patrons. The fact that Artpolice got around is one reasons it's still talked about today. The content while graphic like cartoon was awash in subjects like Free Leonard Peltier, the Sephiroth , black history, comics about the Artpolice peeps. And here and there were hidden subjects about art and politics, about the unfairness of the fine art business.Of course if we'd found backers we might still be making drawings, instead a sort of reverse effect like entropy took Artpolice down, no enemy just time (the great poison). Most of our key players were very young when we began 2 decades later middle age shone across the membership. And none of us had capital, we remained a slave to the process of putting 3 issues a year. The arrival of Stuart Mead kept Artpolice going for a while, Stu was the biggest talent Artpolice had then comparable with Woodward or Ed Rath or Bill McKearn in the early years. Bruce Tapola's work added some darkness to the Artpolice pagesĀ  but the danger was a move towards nilhilism, Nietzshe always warned us about nihilism about cynicism replacing wit. It may just take the world a while to find Artpolice but what does the world have more of than time?