LG Williams 'Everyone Sucks' -- The Facsimile
This facsimile letter for Everyone Sucks weaponizes the polite form of professional correspondence into an obscene, absurd, and aggressively personal art commission. The document is structured like a formal invitation, with redacted recipient details, artist signature, edition notation, and a large "Facsimile" watermark, but its content converts courtesy into sexual provocation and institutional insult. A censored photograph of the artist and the promise that the recipient's name will enter the publication turn embarrassment, consent, and documentation into the work's actual medium. The piece belongs to mail art, conceptual provocation, and West Coast bad manners at once. Its violence is not physical but bureaucratic: the letter makes the recipient part of the artwork by addressing them.
- DATE:
- September 26, 2002
- DOCUMENT TYPE:
- Essay / Critique
- NAMED ARTISTS / FIGURES:
- LG Williams
- INSTITUTIONS / VENUES:
- dai bak hap gallery; HI Gallery; miracle gallery; ArtNet; The Estate of LG Williams; Berkeley; Waikiki; Beverly Hills
- KEYWORDS:
- facsimile as artwork; formal invitation weaponized; edition notation on obscenity; professional correspondence subverted; Facsimile watermark as commentary; politeness turned aggressive; formal structure as container for vulgarity