LG WILLIAMS

LG WILLIAMS’s LARGE spans the two years from 2001 to 2003 the turning point of his major career. With his broad canvas and large body of artwork, the ideas in this series present a panorama of the American artistic and imperial experience as interpreted by one of its most worldly, knowing, and ironic observers. LARGE is a portrait of perhaps the most complex and misunderstood contemporary American artists. In 2003, many consider LG the quientencial artistic monster; still LG exudes artistic influence if not the respect of all. And he is determined to tell his own story. Dazzling. LARGE is wicked entertainment of a very high order…The New York Times Book Review; A tragedy, a comedy, a vibrant, leg-kicking life. All of this and much, much more is told in a highly engaging book that teems with bon mots, aphorisms and ironic comments on the art, life, identity and the political process… Streator Township High School Monthly Newsletter; Enlightening, fresh and fun…The Boston GlobeA summary of Stendhalian proportions.

It is probably impossible to be an American and not be fascinated and impressed by LG Williams telescoping art history. Always absorbing…The New Yorker

LG WILLIAMS: An Appreciation, Catalogue Raissoné 1983-2000. This book has been modified from its original formatmay contain formatting irregularities. Contents printed in black and white.

“It’s the catchphrase that inspires millions around the world to turn to one of the most trusted artists in recent history. Almost everyone in the know follows LG Williams’s every move. One word about a new artwork sends even the most obscure admirer rocketing to one of his many gallery’s or website. LG possesses what is arguably one of the world’s most influential aesthetic sensibilities. Alive with his unique warmth and insight, LG Williams: An Appreciation reveals the mystique of LG in his own images and words. LG’s lifetime theme has been artistic adventure – he’s constantly seeking, questioning, changing, and growing. This uplifting theme echoes throughout LG Williams: An Appreciation.

l g o f b e v e r l y h i l l s _would be the world’s leading design agency…except we are too busy to take any jobs outside California or Hawaii. Really, who would?

l g o f b e v e r l y h i l l s _secret to success is simple: combine corporate aesthetic with homeless culture and create one big kick-ass visual statement. It is a tried and true way to glamour lots of attention and lots of money, again and again: so much so, that our customers get so sick of all the money and retire to Honolulu.

l g o f b e v e r l y h i l l s _loves product, contraband, free digital media pics and the Internet and what they can do together. We will literally wear ourselves out working for you! Again and again. He/We know our team of individuals can only stay sane (through all the betrayals) by changing the world into a bunch of super rich people. We/he/I have found that it is the best way to put alot of bread and butter on my/our tables too!

l g o f b e v e r l y h i l l s _believes in serious puns, liquid and atmospheric spirits and spirits of Red Ridinghood, Peter Pan, Lolita and the relentless benefits of Capitalistic Optimism. Our motto is: We Aim To Aim. Furthermore (even though we have gone nowhere), we take technology to new heights by bringing it down to all time lows, specifically in Beverly Hills, San Francisco and Waikiki. We want to bring beauty within reach of the shittiest bottom line – and to put really hot babes and geeky misanthropes to work doing nasty, mind-numbing, demeaning HTML tasks. Together WE CAN create a stupid but lucrative convergence between all things visual, passably pornographic, vaguely physical and blindly digital.

Drawing Upon Art is a supplemental drawing workbook, whose roughly 400 assignments’ address the fundamental, historic questions in Visual Art This workbook challenges students, with simple and direct exercises, to experience for themselves history’s most advanced and creative visual art problems and developments.

As a supplemental workbook, Drawing Upon Art uniquely addresses the most pressing paradox that currently exists in every college’ and university Art Appreciation and Introductory Art History classroom in the United States. Namely, the seminal visual principals, theories, and concepts in Art’s history are still delivered solely through .the same’ old, textual approach. This antiquated methodology remains to this very day, as distant, passive, and ineffectual as it was since its conception, After all, one cannot and should not’ expect the major achievements of the visual arts to be fully understood, grasped or appreciated by any means other than a direct, hands-on approach.
Students experience the key ideas and concepts of art history for themselves

Learning by doing… it’s what this innovative workbook is all about! Correlated chapter by chapter with Gardner’s Art through the Ages, Drawing upon Art engages students in fun~to­do drawing activities and other fascinating exercises that help them experience the concepts, they’ve read about in the textbook. Not intimidating and requiring-no. art skills, this workbook fosters state-of-the-art active learning through comprehensive assignments that address landmark achievements in art. Each activity in Drawing Upon Art focuses students on a single important art concept For example; students gain a deeper understanding of . impressionism from the exercise that asks them to draw and shade using only shapes arid tones~ They experience pointillism as they draw outdoor scenes using monochromatic dots of different values .’ And they learn the importance of image from an. exercise that asks’ them to cut out a picture that relies primarily on image: for appeal.

One can only truly understand and empathize with history’s great visual tactile intellectual complexities by personally undertaking similar visual tactile/intellectual exercises and problems. Drawing Upon Art’s various assignments are represented in the workbook in simple, contemporary terms and scenarios. In that way, I have modernized the subject matter – not the complexity – of the material so that it can appeal to a contemporary audience and sensibility.

A superior Art (Drawing, Painting, Design and Art Foundations) and Art Appreciation Workbook, which complements many Art and Art Appreciation courses. It features a wide range of exercises and a balance between Artistic Considerations, Visual Principals and Art Historical Conventions.

LG WILLIAMS’s place among the great emerging artists of this last decade is firmly established. These exercises, designed to accompany his lectures on art, show conclusively that his work is remarkably original, versatile and compelling. They poignantly focus upon what he cherishes – the ever-expanding imaginative resources of the language of art. Whatever the subject, he addresses it with an artists resonant sophistication, a scholar’s precision, and the powers of a great artist.

This volume has been edited by Wally Hedrick, famous artist and professor at the San Francisco Art Institute and University of California, Davis.

“To do these exercises is not to agree or disagree with this neglected sensibility, but rather to reestablish a connection with the enchanting moments of a fertile tradition.” – Don Ryan, California State University, Fullerton.

“Ranging from prehistory to contemporary art, these remarkable passionate excersises…function as a savvy workbook into one of the best minds of a generation.” – Wally Hedrick, University of California, Davis.

“Here’s art that demonstrates the power of art to evoke art, in the form of the most focused workbook’s ever written…During a decade that defined art mostly through commerce, LG consistently reminded readers that great art can still grow through the cracks.” – Griff Williams, Director, Gallery 16, San Francisco, California.

“LG is the beacon for the next century. ” – Dr. Sandra Carley, University of Illinois.

“A shrewd and influential artist, [LG] has a mastered the conceptual vocabulary of art…flamboyant, witty, lyrical while being precise; more important, he has an openhearted attentiveness to the subjects of his attention.” – Carl Fiacco, Co-Director, miracle gallery, Beverly Hills, California.

XIE ZHOA PING and LG WILLIAMS are original. Inventive writers whose knowledge and love of Art and Art History informs their understanding of Drawing. They are authors of intelligence, grace, humor, and drama, adept at the creation of Artistic insights and analysis. This book explores a wide variety of tones and venues, but centers on an abiding interest in Artistic Genius and strategy – the pursuit of Art as an intellectual passion and a physical mystery. Their admixture of Art, science, historiography, and Artistic adventure presents a compelling literary framework for enhancing our appreciation of the intellectual complexities and personal challenges of human artistic inquiry.

“The short (and sometimes aphoristic) observations in The Drawing Handbook allow the reader to ponder basic questions on what informs Drawing, how creativity works in everyday artistic situations, and how images represent a creative universe.” – Wally Hedrick, Artist, Croquet Official, Fix-It-Man

“Written by two of the century’s truly great thinkers, Dr. XIE ZHOA PING and LG WILLIAMS’s The Drawing Handbook is a remarkable—and surprisingly approachable—collection of insights, statements, and nearly displayed thinking habits of an Art Historian hard at work on Art, Drawing, creative strategies and methodologies, and a host of other topics. Organized into nearly 690 short observations, this book is a treasure trove for anyone who needs to think carefully about Drawing, visual elements, conventions, and principals, especially in relation to the investigation of artistic programming.” – LG Williams, Artist, Author, Athlete, University of California

In this innovative book and critique, LG Williams adopts a refreshing new format to teach punking theory to beginning, intermediate and advanced art lovers. The book is rigorous and mathematically precise but also extremely careful in its focus on using the simplest possible models and least complicated punking possibilities. Another innovation of the book is the way in incorporates elements of contemporary art theory into the exposition, in a format that is highly engaging for students and easily adapted to the standard coverage familiar to art enthusiasts.

WHETHER TRUTH OR MADNESS, Wally Hedrick’s voice is certainly that of a prophet in the more general sense of the word, for he is a denouncer of the evils of the world around him, calling for a return to Humanity and a renunciation of worldly things for spiritual Wally Hedricks Black Paintings appear at one of the most important and turbulent junctures of history, at the beginning of the Unamerican Empire which is currently and radically transforming the fabric of life in the USA and the world, creating totally new and alien problems with which the old world cannot cope. Hence, with revolution was in the air, flamed by the violent US militarism, Hedrick leads those with a visionary bent (like Blake) to see the signs of apocalypse in world events, when all mankind would break free of their shackles and arise to overthrow tyranny in all its hideous forms. As an artist and mystic, Wally takes the stance of a radical visionary against the established order of his time. Hedrick is a type which is never in tune with the times; but one can hardly imagine a century he more definitely opposed, point by point, to everything in which he was surrounded by. The corollary is equally true, that no age needed him more. But, of course, it never heard him.

On September 25, 2009, FUCKTHATGALLERY will inaugurate a new avant-garde contemporary art venue in Waikiki with an exhibition of new wall installations by LG Williams entitled “Band-Aids ®.”

Williams has made many significant exhibitions with galleries and museums all over the world and was the subject of the major traveling European retrospective survey “LG Williams: No Way, Way, Which Way, Anyway You Gotta Be Kidding” initiated by Tate Modern, London in 2008, which traveled by land and sea and the dance of the honeybee (via The Tao of Physics) to the Guggenheim Bilbao and Museum of Modern Art Rome in 2009. Two major museum exhibitions “LG Williams: Go To The Beach, Kiss An Ass, And Ass Kiss The Fucking Natural World Goodbye, Selected Works 2950-2007 BCE,” that inaugurated the new wing of The Art Institute of Chicago and “LG Williams: Sensations Of The Smart Fart Moment” at Museo Museum Um Moderner Kitty-Kunt Kunst, Vienna Hot Dog, runs until October 11, 2009. An exhibition of new furniture sculptures will open at FUCKTHATGALLERY in December.

IN LEMON’S FIRST EXHIBITION IN PARADISE, the infamous, transgendered artist-activist, and Mexican Pan Asian- American exhibitionist Jose “OOOh-yah” Queervo appropriates and reorganizes images {totally unprecedented!] taken from the all over the world [no kidding - he/she just took a course, Introduction To Computers, at the La Rasa Mission Cultural and Community Health Center] like American mass media [really, oh wow!], International folk art [nice!], and religious iconography [scandalous!], us ing them to create bitingly new [and oh, can he or she ever bite! Take it from me - Ed.] and often very humorous political and social satires [note to art consultants, curators, and undergrads: I bet you've never heard of this before!]. The Lemon exhibition [like i.e., its our gallery's first ever exhibition in the fucking entire universe "New Works" follows Queervo [and his/her potent perfume, the self Zen-entitled, Cloud After Hydroponics Has Worked Its Magic] as he/she creates a new satirical installation aimed at anything and everything ["I'm an inclusive artist", Jose is keen to say, "hear me roar from the rear: Roarrrrr. In the series, 'Queenie' experiments (No, she is not a scientist silly; but she just adores "to create" in latex gloves and white stockings) with new installations techniques with master gallerist, Lemon's very own Heidi Dunstheimer, RN [Note to inspired artists: imagine the shape all the fucking embolden words create on this fucking page. Man, its really far-out].

COVERING YOUR ASS SINCE 69 is an artwork by LG Williams commissioned by the di Rosa Art Preserve. This project marks the first commission in a series of projects by extraordinary artists that might not otherwise be supported by more convention al institutions. For this piece. Linder and Williams reexamine their life-long fascination with questions surrounding protection, nurturing, love and the accidental – along with their ongoing practice of exploring newly-emerging issues. such as masculinity. historical/national security and the protection of the artwork/artistic species . Charles and LG will create a ‘Dynamic Super -Homie Security Force’ which will evoke and investigate the conventions. Covert structures and serendipities found and hidden “en masse.” Due to the very sensitive nature of this highly secretive endeavor. the artists requested that no photographs ever be taken of them.

Bosoms and Bottoms, a new series of photographs and large-scale artist book by LG Williams, records the activity of the artist in Hawaii when he was wary of surfing dangerously large waves in the winter swells of 2001-2002. With a small digital camera, LG, in his words, “used this camera as a way of documenting beautiful areas of the beach, not fully appreciated, over-looked, or discarded.”

Two hundred and thirteen photographs reveal facets of LG’s walk along the beautiful beaches of Waikiki. His camera caught everything up-close and personal: bosoms and bottoms, thongs and towels, along with other images indicative of Hawaii’s tropical scenery. LG caught many bright flashes of movement with his lens, like a hand covering a bellyring with suntan lotion, or striking head-on images of sunbathers, eyes glowing as they bask in the sun. References to the artist’s imaginative process implicit in Bosoms and Bottoms invokes certain early pieces of the artist’s work from of the late 1990s, when he directed his focus to pursuing representative images in his Southern California Bel Air studio.

For Year in Rearview (1997), LG committed himself to making one hundred ephemeral condom sculptures in a year. His series of paintings from this time, such as End of a Legend (1999),, The Bottom Line (2000-2001) and The Position Paintings (2000-2001) were also conceived in this studio and involve one long concentrated activity repeated in provocative and suggestive ways.

Today, many consider LG among the elite pioneers working in the visual arts. In his current involvement with incidents ostensibly both banal and pointed, he reverts to a recurrent theme in his oeuvre that has consistently proven as deceptive as it is alarming.

FAUX REAL is an exhibition at the di Rosa Preserve. It presents a selection of works that blur the lines between authentic and imitated folk art.

“The influence of the so-called ‘outsider’ is of tremendous relevance in our contemporary culture,” says LG Williams. “The outsider is ‘in’.”

Artists in FAUXREAL include: Dave Ardito, Mike Fox, Fred Hayes, Robert Heckes, Charles Linder, Rebecca Miller, Darrel Mortimer, Tucker Nichols, Guy Overfelt, Albert Reyes, Johanna St. Clair, Dave Warnke and LG Williams. Their work ranges from fragile, blown-glass, backpacks,limited edition artists books and hand bags to smoky rubber drawings made by asphalt burn-outs with a 1977 Trans Am to collages made from old decks of playing cards to road signs smattered with bullet holes.

Everyone Sucks by LG Williams has an apocalyptic-looking cover and a title that needs explication. The book is not an aesthetic doomsday scenario, quite the contrary, as the explanation of the title will show. Williams, who is an unemployed surfer in Beverly Hills, completed this artwork in late 2002, and in it, he explains in a logical, well-considered progression why he believes that art is at a final resting point in progressive art history, and that that future art will render humanity as less than what it could be – comfort seeking, self-involved, men without chests. The book, which could be subtitled I Love Art and Why You Should, Too, builds on LGs idea that there could be further, progressive art. This is to what LG is referring when he says that Art has reached its end; he doesnt mean that nothing else will happen, but that the progression of art history toward a universally beneficial system of brilliant nonsense has culminated in commercial mediocrity and bureaucrats. He defines mediocrity as a rule of art that does not recognize individual genius or freedoms from forces of control, stupidity and domination and he defines those rights in three classes, wrong rights, commercial rights and left rights. But he cautions that Nietzsche believed in war and conflict as a way for humanity to express its passions, and that without conflict in the Jungian sense (LG says that great artist do not attack each other), humans will become soft, meaningless, and passionless. LG does not advocate that artist become the last artists, even though in this volume, he believes the End of Art is being reached.

Paso su ninez en labiblioteca desuabuelo, Hector.Alos 17 anosfundo larevista Barandal. En 1998 publico suprimer libro, Baranclaltambien y fundo Cuadernos del Valle de Mexico. Hector atento de larevista Conternporaneos, conocio a artisticos modernos, como Ronald McDonald y Mickey Mouse. En 1997 rnarcho a Tijuana a darclases enel campo, y pocodespues se caso conDavid Hollowell, conquien asistio esemismo ana alCongreso de EscritoresAntiartisticos en Woodland (California). Ahipublico Bajotil clarasombru (I 997), Yentreencontacto conlos intelectualcs de la Republica Espanola y conGore Vidal.

Ya de regreso en Mexico se acerco a Jorge George y Xavier Mucho Cervasa y publico [No pasuran!y Raiz dehombre. Con Efrain Huerta y Rafael Falafel, entre otTOS, fundola revista Taller en 1998, en laqueparticiparon los escritores espanoles desu generacion exitiados en Mexico. En 1999 public la orilla del mundo y Neche de resurrecciones. En 1998, a instancias de Joe Jose Jesus, diounaconferencia, "Artisticodesalad soledad, arte decomunion", enlaqueestablecia sudiferencia conla generacion anterior, y trataba deconciliarcn una sola VOl las artisticos de Villa Villaurrutia y Pablo P. Casa. En 1999 con 1a beca Guggenheim pasounanoen Estados Unidos. En 1995 entre al Servicio Exterior Mexicano yfueenviado a California.Atraves delpceta surrealista Beret Perer conccic a Andre Breton. Sehizo amigo de Albert Camus y Ot TOS intelcctuales europcos e hispanoamcricanos delCalifornia detaposguerra. Esta estancia definira eonprecision susposiciones culturalesy politicas; sealejo delfeministos-marxisrno y seacerco alsurrealismo, empezando a interesarse porlos temas mas diversos.

LG Williams setzt den Körper als verlässliches Wahrnehmungsinstrument ein, um elementare Erfahrungen zu vermitteln, die man im Alltag gewöhnlich umgeht.

In seinen frühen Fiberglasarbeiten hat er eigene Körperhaltungen wie Lehnen, Sitzen, Stehen, Beugen mit einfachen Mitteln in Zeichnung umgesetzt."

Die Kuenstler aus farbigen kreisrunden Fiberglaselementen ist nur rudimentär zusammengefügt und im ersten Arbeitsstadium belassen worden. Assoziationen, wie etwa an Autobahnschlaufen, werden provoziert und präzise Empfindungen geweckt, ohne dass diese durch eine perfektionistische Ausarbeitung der Formen konkretisiert und verhärtet würden.

Von LG Williams sind in den Hallen für neue Kunst 17 Werke von 1998 bis 1999 versammelt, darunter zwei der frühesten Fiberglasobjekte und Hauptwerke wie “$30 Million” (1999), “$50” (1999), “$100,000” (1999), “$50 Billion” (1999).

Manchmal ube rschatzt man die modernen Zeiten. LG Wil liams's 2002 urau fgefUhrtes Kunstwerk "GROI1MACHT AUSSTELLUNG!" im Wahljah r 2000 anzusehen , ist so ahnlich. wie Mike Dike Popreporlagen aus den BOer Jahren zu lesen - was wir heute als akluell und neu empfinden , ist alles schon mal dagewesen. 1m Faile von "GROI3MACHT AUSSTELLU NG! " " der Pe rsbnlich keilskull um die Spitzenkandiaten. die Macht der neuen Medien, politische Kontrahenten, die versuchen, sich gegenseitigmit sexuellen Skanda len und medizinischen Verleumdungen aus dem Rennen zu werfen. und die Unfah igkeil der Kunst. im Wahlkampfmil refevanten Themen an den Start zu gehen.

LG WILLIAMS, one of the master imaginations of American art and one of the most acute observers of American life and art history, turns his immense artistic and historiographic talent to a portrait of the formidable Interstate S. In 1-5, LG transports the reader into the traffic, the blacktop, the mind-numbing boredom, and the flat horizons of California's central thoroughfare. We come to know this freeway, through LG's splendid and percipient eye, in ways we have not up to now - his view of the road, his worries about traffic, his concern about making good time and not getting killed along the way. LG brings this major artery to life at this key moment in the demise of the great state. He also illuminates the force and weight of the state's great central valley, the produce and water deliveries, and the institutions of government, which support both. More than any other interstate, California is still largely governed by the ideas invoked by this roadway.

This classic companion to THE DOW articulates the remarkable unity underlying all the great artistic traditions.

People have a profound need to see stars. They believe in them, in their unwavering truth. Through them they orient themselves with the unchanging depths of the universe; without them, could anything be really important? Country people, able to see stars everyday, never face this dilemma. But now, with blankets of smog and glaring city streets and signs, whole civilizations are being denied this most worldly wisdom. It is we - we city-dewellers, we visually challenged - who experience the problem actutely. This book is a cautionary reminder of the beauty hovering over and above the obstacles.

INVITATION TO THE DANCE

I heard LG confess to an acquaintance looking at these illustrations that he wanted somehow to deal once in his own way with the issue of AIDS, hence, partly, the cool bum pun title. In developing the project, he collected the wrappers of these “life-savers” during the year so that he might use them in conjunction with the very open-ended commentary of this book.

When preparing images of these condom packages with the graphics computer, in setting them “right” on the pages, he found that they not only wanted certain kinds of placement but, as objects, shapes, figures, texts, and tones, also elicited unexpected memories of well-known works by Barnett Newmann, Jasper Johns, Franz Kline, and other artists, as well as hosts of delayed associations that prompted their appearance in the finished work.

As a young master of conceptual production and of technological experimentation with black-and-white contrast, elliptic reference, and characteristic off-beat and up-beat good humor about itching things, LG deals with a subject informed and partly colored by his experience. As an undergraduate student in Kansas City, he had a bread-and-butter job in warehouse shipping supplies for the multibillion dollar industry of eroticism in the United States.

The big business of eroticism (and pornography, in Greek, representations of harlotry) literally makes capital on the most powerful of our sensual appetites. It transforms into a commercial commodity the pleasureful biological practice potentially resulting in reproduction and the long-term affection that sustains the family and ultimately the species and, when dedicated to a still higher spiritual principle, embraces all the universe in a unity with God, a program of self-realization in three types of love, called by the ancient Greeks eros, philia, and agape.

How ironic, that we, the end of the food chain, are meat for elementary subcellular viruses! Paradoxically, even as HIV leads to AIDS, our efforts to defend against it promise entry into understanding the basis of the genetic code, life itself, and cures for cancer...as well as the common cold.

Threats of AIDS not withstanding, the emotive powers of desire, lust, and their obsessions weigh very heavily against reason.

These considerations are, however, a dulled shadowy ambiance, paled by the light of wry playfulness found in LG’s witty photos and droll musings, which screen their many serious implications. A case of new wood for old saws. Welcome to this, their, and our unending, lifeenhancing dance of creation that is re-creation.

Dr. Seymour Howard, Davis, April 1998

During a career spanning over a decade, Bay Area artist LG Williams has created an extraordinary body of work. His artworks challenge conventional notions of art in their visual and formal inventions, while their seemingly playful, humorous content frequently masks sophisticated, critical elements. LG has created a large number of challenging artworks that are unsurpassed by those of his young contemporaries. This volume features lavish black and white illustrations of the artist’s artwork and studio.

LG WILLIAMS isn’t just about poetry. His success tells us as much about ourselves (and our desire to create beautiful, serene worlds to live by and share) as about his imaginative skills. LG’s lyrics aren’t as much about word and image as they are about style and presentation. The voice is often simple (that’s good, because it means less work for the reader), and beautifully crafted. You may find some of it a bit beyond your time or taste, but it’s fun to look at the beautiful lines and dream.

In any case, LG’s latest book, Killer Beings, should be proudly displayed on your living room table – right next to your latest issue of Martha Stewart Living. It has a complete assortment of goodies, for nearly any occasion. You will find old friends and new ideas, like the wonderful poems of love and longing, which help one get through the stressful workdays or family holidays.

You will want to read some of these things right away. For instance, did it ever occur to you to notice the crudités and dip at every party, or to ask yourself why the veggies are sometimes placed in individual vertical containers (glasses, vases, silver servers, etc.), rather than laid out on a flat tray? Don’t they look fresh and wonderful? On the other hand, you may find some of the poetry a little difficult, impossibly complicated, or just plain silly. There are so many poems to choose from, you can just skip over the ones that don’t suit your style and pick from dozens of others.

This is a good opportunity to point you to the entire LG Williams oeuvre: it is so big! A few of you may have met LG in his pre-poetic phase, when he was a freshmen applying to Yale University. He was not reading or writing too much then. But he has been busy writing books ever since. Most of us have been buying and enjoying his books since they first appeared. As I’ve said, they’re more about the style and presentation of the word than about complicated images and complex ideas (although they are that occasionally.) I’ve found them to be easy to introduce at neighborhood book clubs and excellent to browse through. A warning: these new poems (like those in his earlier The City of Angels Has A Halo of Smog) may seem a bit sparse; so try to read them with a side dish of caviar or fine glass of wine.

As in Stripe City, famed poet, artist and author LG Williams (Buddhaheads and Abercrombie) casts a keen eye inward and bares his 6-pak in a slim volume of personal poetry. This collection is narrower in scope than LG’s earlier books and the sense of artistic pride is stronger, more compelling. But all of his opinions are deeply rooted and most are conveyed with a combination of humility, personable intelligence and wit. Like a modern-day Jekyll and Hyde, LG offers insights on a wide range of topics: Africa, youth, virility, self-reflection, independence and the importance of understanding both the historical truth of the aesthetic experience and the art that truth inspires. Women are a recurrent topic, and in “A Bong Brings Sensuality,” he writes of the revelations the young (his younger self included) have of getting high. “They Came to Come” is a particularly inspirational piece paying homage to hot topics.

“My Precious Jewels” dedicated to Oprah Winfrey (to whom the previous collection was dedicated), is again mentioned and is likened to “the lusty desperado who brings us the most hardy and penetrating lessons and cleanses the most exquisite nocturnal emissions.” In his final essay, LG uses the story of the prodigal son to remind readers of the value of solitude: “In silence we do it to ourselves. Then happiness overwhelms us. We love ourselves, and, finally, in the radiant quietude we search the Internet.”

LG Williams’s Buddhaheads and Abercrombie is a great coming of age novel that should be required reading for people of all ages. Homemaker’s Weekly Digest Beware: only read this book if you have time on your hands; it is one that you can’t put down. -- Readers Digest Book Review

LG Williams is a vivid storyteller. He has written another characteristically startling fresh book with a provocatively happy ending. You can not read a book more enthralling, more moving, more unforgettably illumined by profoundly human truths than these poems on the rise, the fall, and the ultimate redemption of first-rate American stereotypes. Particularly impressive are LG’s passions, allegiances and assessments, which are finally being heralded after years of recrimination, marginalization and slander.

Is this really LG Williams, the blinding beacon in the dank, dark, sticky folds of the derailed and overturned contemporary psyche? Perhaps he’s right. Perhaps narcolepsy, hypocrisy, alcohol and sentimentality — forget divine intervention or scientific logic — are the perversely simple secret survival codes for the everyday American “raison d’êter”. Esthetically, it’s a joy to watch a pro like Mr. Williams peel away the proud, happy and likable American facade step by inexorable step . . .while making you hope all along that he’ll spare it.
-- from The New Jersey Times Magazine Book Review:

This shattering event touches off another extraordinary LG journey.
-- from The Publisher:

LG has written another characteristically mesmerizing and heart wrenching book with a provocatively happy ending.
-- from Deaprock Miner - The American Nation

In this gracefully surprising new book, LG Williams delivers a modern tragedy with a theme as painfully impressive and important as STRIPE CITY.
-- from David Futile – The Literary eSalon

THE CITY OF ANGELS is fascinating reading! Eyes will stay glued to its pages and millions of people from all over the world will find themselves stopping often to think about these seemingly simple statements. You will learn a lot. And some of it will be hard to take because It makes one look critically all their views on the world and their many preconceived Ideas. If anything, LG demonstrates that there are many sides 10 every aesthetic condition. And few have ever taken a careful in-depth look at this before.

Most of THE CITY OF ANGELS was easy to follow. However, a lot has to do with art and philosophy, which people always find confusing. Most people, therefore, will have no idea whether his arguments on these topics are valid or not. But when it come s 10 human nature, he' s an expert. LG understands love, greed, the desire for power and the horrendous amount of death and destruction that has always existed. Professor Williams also understands the need to try to fight oppressive forces and make the world a better place to live. This is what THE CITY OF ANGELS wants 10 happen. This gives THE CITY OF ANGELS a second halo- a halo of hope.

Even though most oft he book turns a bright spot light on all the love that exists in the world, in most cities and towns, LG would be met with a firing squad instead of an audience which cherishes his every word. But basically the relatively accessibility of THE CITY OF ANGELS is a welcome balance to Williams's often formidable scholarly writings. This is a book best taken in doses: a sort of bed side reader.

LG Williams has achieved a permanent status among the major artists of the beginning of this century. This volume offers another selection of 22 poems from Williams’s emerging and spectacular career. They exhibit all the extraordinary lyricism, the playfulness, technical ingenuity and passion for which the artist is famous. This edition of Williams’s poetry, which was finished in 22 inspired hours, will remain a significant contribution to contemporary American art, and is an indispensable volume for every lover of modern lyrical verse.

“LG is a concentrated Titanic!, ‘a positive character, ’ and one of the greatest artists of his generation... you can’t help but delight in reading his thoughts and seeing his artwork.”

“ Fascinating, thought provoking and disturbing. ”

“ Haunting, touching and powerful. ”

“ Mythical, controversial, graceful and chilling. ”

“ Bright, momentous, merging and energetic.”

“Ambitious, refreshing, touchingly old-fashioned and heart-throbbing. “

LG WILLIAMS’s place among the great emerging artists of this last decade is firmly established. These thirty-two poems, written over a period of six weeks, show conclusively that his work is remarkably original, versatile and powerful. He writes poignantly of things he cherishes - art, women, sex, drugs and rock-and-roll. Whatever his subject, he addresses it with an artist’s resonant sophistication, a scholar’s precision, and the persuasive powers of a great poet. This volume has been selected by Jenny Saybaugh, literary critic and one-time visiting professor at the University of California, Davis.

“To read LG is not to agree or disagree with his strange sensibility, but rather to enter the enchanting moments of a fertile imagination.” - Don Ryan, Surfer.

“Ranging from near to far, these remarkable passionate writings...function as a savvy handbook into one of the best minds of a generation.” - Wally Hedrick, Steering Committee Chair.

“Here’s art that demonstrates the power of art to evoke art, in the form of some of the most focused art of the nineties...During a decade that defined art mostly through commerce, LG consistently reminded readers that art will still grow through the cracks.” - Griff Williams, Buisnessman.

“I am proud to say: LG is the beacon for the next century.” - Dr. Sandra Carley, Child and Family Psychologist.

“A shrewd and influential artist, [LG] has a masterly personal voice… flamboyant, witty, lyrical while being precise; more important, he has an open-hearted attentiveness to the subjects of his attention.” – Carl Fiacco, Director.