David Williams works in Brooklyn NY. In this series, Williams took excerpts from American literature and political discourse that deal directly with early forms of American Imperialism. These text are coupled with distressed gilded plastic that has been set into wet plaster. After drying, the set plaster blocks are carved out and the interior vein of gold is revealed.  The process is both additive and reductive. Despite their formal appeal these pieces are performative as well and were designed to be read aloud by the viewer.  This expert comes from a 1902 speech from Massachusetts Senator G. F. Hoar, a Republican, in which colonial profiteering and war privateering are movingly criticized in words astoundingly relevant to contemporary events. 

Untitled

2016

Each panel 38'' x 63''

Plastic, hydrocal, 24k gold leaf, enamel.