Machine Politick

The Patriot Pony Project is an equine based performance art exhibition. The project is a partnership between MachinePolitick and Whispering Winds; designed to promote patriotism and liberty through the utilization of a series of living canvases. The beautiful horses of Whispering Winds will be hand painted with non-toxic materials by Frances Byrd of MachinePolitick. Each painted horse will be a living manifestation of an original piece of art designed specifically for this live event.

Please join us at Whispering Winds on Saturday, June 12, 2010. More details will be released as they develop, including hotel accommodations and other events in the area for those traveling out of town for the event. At the end of the performance piece, there will be a short description of the project’s formation and the artist’s passion for Liberty and America as well as a description of her larger projects to promote those ideas through her art. The audience will then be invited to ask questions, tour the facilities at Whispering Winds, and view fine art in the horse barn.

Whispering Winds

1418 Old Route 119

Mt. Pleasant, Pennsylvania 15666-3511

For additional information, please read the Proposal Letter and Project Explanation, or contact frances@machinepolitick.com

This is the introductory flier for a project I launched this weekend. As mentioned, there will be more information as we secure vendors and determine entry fees and times for the event. Below, you will find a short description of the people behind the project.

Some of you here are familiar with me and my work, others are not. About seven years ago, I decided to combine my passion for politics with my talents as an artist and create political art. In the beginning, I focused mainly on issues of big government and hypocrisy. Last year, I started to become politically active and branched out with my work to include patriotic and Liberty based art.

About a year ago, I teamed up with ModernConservative.com to form a Conservative art movement called Declarationism. The home for that project is Liberatchik, where other artists are gathering to add their perspective and join the movement. In the fall, I hope to launch the movement on a national level with the help of my friend Claire, who is hosting the Patriot Pony Project. I met Claire last year at the Taxpayer March on Washington, DC where we discovered a common passion for limited government and individual Liberty. We also share the belief that America is a great country, patriotism is not a stigma, and the people who serve in the military deserve our respect and thanks.

Claire is the owner of Whispering Winds Farm in Mt. Pleasant, Pennsylvania. She provides several services on her facilities including event planning, horse boarding and breeding, and therapy programs.

Claire and I have teamed up to form The Patriot Pony Project, described above, to promote the ideas of liberty and patriotism. For that reason, the event has been planned around Flag Day this year. In the fall, I hope to return to her farm to launch Liberatchik and raise awareness of the Declarationist Art Movement on a national scale.

This project is made possible by the following sponsors:

Modern Conservative.com

If you would like to contribute to my efforts on a personal level, or are a member of an organization that would like to sponsor this event, please contact me for more information. Your support is greatly appreciated. frances@machinepolitick.com

In an effort to make this project and the future of American culture as successful as possible, I am asking everyone to pass it on as far and wide as possible. Repost on your blog, send to friends, submit to your local paper and anything else you can think of. I will be cross posting at Liberatchik as well. Please consider joining our Liberatchik Facebook page.

See the Art pages for information and prices on individual pieces.

The Patriot Pony Project June 12, 2010

Dear Fellow Patriot,

My name is Frances Byrd. I am a wife, mother and political artist. My work is not typical of the genre, as I am a Conservative who believes in limited government and the individual. The main goal of my work is to promote these ideas as well as to explain the importance of Liberty and my passion for America. I have been working very hard to build an art movement for others like me who may be afraid to voice their opinions or are afraid they are alone. Every day, I find more people who share my views and passion and our movement is growing.

I have begun planning The Patriot Pony Project with my friend Claire in Mt. Pleasant , Pennsylvania. More information on the project and my portfolio can be found at http://www.machinepolitick.com . Here is a short description of what I am planning:

• I will create an equine based performance art exhibition where I will paint patriotic symbols on Claire’s horses. The paint is non-toxic and the horses are painted by children regularly, as part of Claire’s therapy business.

• I will speak about the project’s formation and my passion for Liberty and America. I will also give a short description of my larger projects. Claire will speak about her farm and the programs she provides to her community.

• The audience will then be invited to ask questions, tour the facilities at Whispering Winds, and view fine art in the horse barn.

I take great pride in the fact that I do not apply for public funding of my work through grants or fellowships. I work from home, make many sacrifices to fund my work and do it entirely out of my own pocket. I have long opposed the NEA and I look forward to the day when art is once again funded by the private sector. One of the main goals of my efforts and the movement I am building is to promote art based on its merits, rather than its shock value.

I humbly appeal to your generosity in order to make these goals a reality. The influence that art and entertainment have on our culture is tremendous. It is time we had a say in the direction our country is going and the message that we want to pass on to future generations. Please consider making a donation, sending supplies from my wish list, or purchasing art and merchandise from my site. I prefer that you purchase something tangible to remind you of your contribution to this important effort. I don’t want a handout, but I can’t do this alone. If you can, pass this letter on to your friends.

Thank you in advance for your support and your time. I greatly appreciate all of the wonderful feedback I receive about my efforts. The future of our nation and our culture is in our hands. Will you take a stand with me?

Sincerely,

Frances Byrd

www.machinepolitick.com

In an effort to make this project and the future of American culture as successful as possible, I am asking everyone to pass it on as far and wide as possible. Repost on your blog, send to friends, submit to your local paper and anything else you can think of. I will be cross posting at Liberatchik as well. Please consider joining our Facebook page.

I read this blog post back in June when it was already a couple years old. I left a comment anyway because I was so happy to see someone else writing about the significance of art’s impact on the rest of culture. There were some good comments and it made me realize that there are people out there who get it. I left a couple links to MachinePolitick and Liberatchik hoping to hear back from the author. This week, a musician contacted me because of my comments and is now considering joining Liberatchik. Here is the full article. I hope you will go to the page and look at some more writing to get a little perspective on what it means to be Conservative outside the US.

From the blog: Oz Conservative

Why artists should be conservative

Since the end of WWII artists have been overwhelmingly liberal modernists. Where has this got them?

They have become irrelevant. As a reward for their role in transgressing the traditional order, artists have been given a few state grants and then ignored.

A liberal modernist society doesn’t need artists. It’s run by a managerial class on a technocratic basis. There simply isn’t an important social function in such a system for art.

Serious artists, therefore, have been shunted out of the public square. How many people today know or care about an important contemporary poet or painter or playwright or composer?

It wasn’t always so. Traditional societies ultimately found a basis for order on the transcendent (on the recognition of a “good” existing beyond our own immediate individual preferences or desires). It wasn’t functionaries who were best able to express and communicate the transcendent to the public. This was a role for high art, a role which gave artists an important place within society and culture.

Consider the case of poetry. Wordsworth had a tremendous influence in the early 1800s. If you read his most famous poems, they express the transcendent in Wordsworth’s response to nature. By the 1920s and 30s, you get poets like E.E. Cummings, who is a modernist in some regards, but who still expresses the transcendent in his love poetry.

And today? In Australia the only really well-known poet (known to the general public) is Les Murray, and it’s probably no coincidence that he is unusually anti-modernist in his world view.

People once cared about art because they cared about the “transcendent moment” that artists might communicate in their work. They also cared about art because art had a role in sustaining a civilisation: in giving finer expression to what was both good and necessary to the existence of a people and culture.

Artists might, for instance, represent to the public a higher ideal of fatherhood, or of national feeling, or of the masculine virtues, or of romantic love.

What is there for artists to do in alliance with liberal modernism? For a while, they could assist modernists in trashing the remnants of a traditional culture. There was a moment, too, when they tried to align art with the goals of technocratic efficiency (think of the principle of the architect Le Corbusier that a house is a “machine for living in”).

But none of this has a future. Eventually there is no more tradition to set yourself against, and there is no reason for an art based on efficient, abstract function to resonate with the public (most people do their best to ignore it).

It’s difficult to see how the situation for artists can improve; the further we descend into liberal modernism the more irrelevant that artists become to the processes of society.

So let me repeat: it makes sense for artists to decouple themselves from the forces of liberal modernism, as it is through these very forces that they are being relegated to insignificance. The hope for artists is that liberal modernity will falter and that this will allow a reassertion of the traditional within Western culture.

Please check out the comments as well. Some of them are as insightful as the article. I am also cross posting the article at Liberatchik.

This video is in response to Bill Clinton and James Carville’s assertion that they will dig up dirt on the Tea Party Leaders in order to discredit the movement.

For more information, check out the article on Big Government.

More info is available on the Tea Party Patriots website.

You can submit your own videos at I Am the Tea Party Leader.

Now that all the dust has settled, and everyone has forgotten the NEA scandal over the promotion of Obama’s agenda, I am hear to remind you that it is time to step up. I hear people complain everywhere I go about public funding of the arts, the lack of quality art, the over-abundance of Liberal political art, the lack of patriotic or Conservative work, and on and on. A few months ago, Glenn Beck threw out a challenge to the art community and Conservatives to send him work so he could put on a show. Nothing came of it. It is time to stop complaining and start doing.

At some point when I was planning to have a child, I made the decision to become a political artist. The two go hand in hand, as you would know after talking to me for five minutes. I understand that America is a Constitutional Republic and expect our government to adhere to the checks and balances as well as the restrictions of power laid out by the Founders. They do neither. I believe America is a great country, because of the prosperity we have earned through hard work and perseverance. I believe that as a people we strive to do the right thing and help the rest of the world, even if our leaders tend to bungle things. I support our military and feel both proud and thankful of their service and sacrifice. Most importantly, I am consumed by a passion to promote the concepts of Liberty and individualism. Now, I worry about what the future holds and what kind of world my child will live in.

After a year of intense networking and marketing, and consequently little painting, I am making some headway. Now, I need to get my message to a larger audience. That is where you come in. I cannot do this alone, nor do I want to. I want to help as many people as I can with my efforts because the concept of Liberty is more important than my individual desire to make a buck or run my mouth. The more people involved, the more successful we will be and the more prosperous we will become. That’s the glory of the free market.

It is not my intention to berate or guilt you into participation. I know how you view the art community; I deal with them enough to know most of your disdain is deserved. However, that is exactly why supporting my efforts is so important. I’m not asking for a handout, I’m asking for you to help me use my talents to influence our culture. We need to take it back on all fronts. I don’t want you to just send a donation. I want you to buy a piece of art or a t-shirt, send me art supplies, or contact me about a commission. You should receive something for your patronage and I will feel better knowing I provided you with something tangible in exchange for your generosity. We have been complacent for too long, and it is time to step up.

My first public event is scheduled for June 12, 2010 in Mt. Pleasant , Pennsylvania.

This article will be cross posted at Liberatchik.

The following is an article by a new member of Liberatchik. His name is Robert Jones, and he is a spectacular photographer. His writing is great as well, and not only because he likes my work. Check it out, and leave a comment. I’m already looking forward to the next article.

Leaving the Conservative Closet

I hate political art. Political art is not for me. I am uncomfortable with it mainly because its foremost practitioners’ politics are way stronger than their art – and their politics suck.

Yet, if you are like I, you know viscerally what it feels like to be a conservative artist, especially if you’re one who takes his art seriously.  It feels lonely as hell.

Especially if you won’t sell out.  It has not been news that the art world is peopled with flaneurs, shockers, and other assorted pretentious dilettantes who pose at being outcasts.  But, you know who the real outcast is: It’s you.

It’s not just that you don’t fit in – you even feel as though you’d have been exiled from the Island of Misfit Toys.  It’s not that you are lacking in a certain social DNA – it’s that you’re completely bereft of it. Kind of like that scene in Taxi Driver when Robert DeNiro, woefully inept at dating prowess, takes an uptight Cybill Shepherd to a porno theater on a first date.

By day, you’re just some guy or girl with a workaday job.  You save up enough loose change and singles to finance what your family regards as your “eccentric hobby.”   The earmarks of your passion are the oil paint you can’t fully scrape out from under your fingernails or the smell of photo fixer you can’t get out of your skin and clothes no matter how often you wash them.

You hide your political beliefs.  You know you’re not a liberal, a progressive, one of those mindless lemmings who’ve “gone green.”  But, you’re struggling in your art career, and your position in the gallery scene is too precarious to let people know the “real you.”

So, you adopt a bifurcated self, hoping to avoid a confrontation with the movers and shakers, those oh-so insouciant curators in black turtlenecks, whose opinions you secretly despise whilst simultaneously craving their imprimatur.

You swell with a strange kind of “half” pride when you finally see your work hanging in one of those trendy galleries.  You’re “half” elated when a collector buys one of your pieces.  You convince yourself that you’ve kept your art “pure,” because you’ve kept politics out of your art – while hiding your personal political beliefs from the majority who automatically assume that because you’re an artist that you’re also a leftist.

You make yourself believe that you’ve kept yourself “above it all” by not stooping to the same level as the rest of the art community. Yet, deep down, you also know the very minute your secret political self is unmasked, that you will be blackballed, that so-called “friends” will drop you like a hot potato, and that in the art world you’ll be persona non grata.

You’ve censored who you are in order to stay safe, fit in, and pass by unnoticed.  But your real self looks upon your artist self with nothing but scorn and shame, because deep down, you fear that you have sold out in some more insidious way than by prostituting your art.

You tell yourself it’s not your fault, because you know that the selfsame “tolerant” lefties have stacked the deck against Republicans, conservatives, and libertarians.  They get away with it because of Political Correctness, you tell yourself.

But then, from out of the past comes the stinging rebuke that maybe they are not the only ones culpable for this bad scene.  The admonition that, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing,” echoing in your mind comes not from Edmund Burke, but your own conscience.

Yes, when the intolerant left finds out about your clandestine conservatism, of course your art career will be ruined:  You have already abdicated the sanctity of your conscience by prostrating yourself before people who hate what you stand for.  Why should they suddenly respect you when they already know you’re lacking in spine and stomach?

Or, you can take some schooling from Don Vito Corleone: “You can act like a man! What’s the matter with you?”  I have never had the problems so many conservative artists have with liberals because I have never played this self-defeating charade of hiding my political beliefs.  I don’t bash people over the head with them, but at gallery openings and such I don’t let an insult go by without at least offering an “I disagree with that.”  If you are forthright about who you fully and truly are from the start, then you set the terms by which others deal with you, not they.

Do you see the Tea Party movements the past year, filled with people who found the courage to stand up and defend their cherished beliefs and the Constitution of the United States of America?  These are regular guys and gals who finally realized that being consoled by their membership in the “silent majority” was a fool’s bargain – their liberal opposition was only too happy to oblige their silence.

What am I asking of my fellow artists?  To join Liberatchik?  Sure, but Liberatchik is merely a symptom of the problem, not the solution.  True solutions to the ills that plague society seldom rest in collective action.

The solution rests in being true to yourself, and standing up for your beliefs as an artist, as a citizen, as an individual.  What is needed, now more than ever, are individuals whose purpose in life is to fully engage in the pursuit of their happiness, not in wanting to be liked by everybody.

Take a look at Frances Byrd’s example.  This Jeanne d’Arc of the conservative art movement is out there, standing on her own two feet, facing the fire, but succeeding.  She’s succeeding because she’s true to her art, true to herself, and her soul is not for sale.

(And, if I may add, she has raised the editorial cartoon to the level of high art — here is some political art I actually admire).

Take an assessment of your own life as an artist, your own soul.  You will be welcome by us at Liberatchik, should you so wish, not because you’re “one of us,” but because you’re true to yourself.

Then, half the battle will be won already.

This article will be cross posted at Conservative Punk.

Why support this project?

• Promote America and patriotism through the arts.

• Support the formation of a Conservative art movement.

• Support a return to the concept of promoting art based on merit rather than controversy.

How can you support my work?

• Donate money to MachinePolitick, co- founder of the project. This money will go to planning and organizing events under the name of the Patriot Pony Project.  Expenses include: art supplies, marketing, event necessities, travel, lodging and food.

• If you are not comfortable sending money, I understand. A wish list of art supplies has been created so you can send exactly what I need to create my art.

• Buy my t-shirts on Red Bubble, or my art on MachinePolitick.

• Volunteer at events to help manage sales of art and merchandise, hand out information, take donations or collect entry fees, etc.

• Provide services at events in exchange for advertising space on MachinePolitick and booth space at events.

Why is a Conservative art movement important?

Much has been debated recently about the state of art in America. Arguably, it’s in a pretty sad state as a whole. The underlying philosophy would have us believe that we should do what we feel rather than what is good and someone else owes us a living. If we become prosperous through our work, we have somehow demeaned ourselves or taken advantage of someone less fortunate. This mind-set in the art and entertainment industries is rampant throughout our culture with most people unaware of when or how they came by these ideas. They continue to be perpetuated through fine art, movies, music and various commercial arts. Most of it is not by accident. I believe our culture is directly influenced by the arts, and there is only one point of view getting significant representation.

Please allow me to introduce myself, and my proposal to make true changes in the art community. I support limited government and individual liberty, the Constitution and the rule of law. I am using my talents as an artist to spread the word for Liberty and build a community of Conservative artists with the same goals. I am making a stand to call out the Liberal establishment in Washington, Hollywood and the art community. There are many more artists like me out there, but many are afraid to voice their political opinions in the face of such daunting opposition. The reality is, we face a community that opposes our point of view and will not give us representation, regardless of whether there is a market for our work.

For this reason, we cannot succeed without support from the Conservative community. We need patrons to support our efforts. This must be a grass roots movement, funded by private contributions. A state sponsored program is doomed to fail. More importantly, state sponsored art is an affront to my talents as an artist and my principles as an individual.

I decided to launch an artistic revolution against the NEA and its participating hacks, sell-outs and parasites. If the government wants to promote propaganda that pushes their agenda, pay for it with tax money and keep it quiet so they can develop “legal language” to ‘protect themselves’, I’m going to give ‘em hell.

What will your contributions cover?

Hotel accommodations: $600

Gas: $300 ( Two cars round trip from Ga to Pa transporting artwork and family members who have volunteered to help me with the event.)

Food: $350

Restroom facilities: $450 (Port O Potty rental over the weekend.)

Art supplies: +/- $300 (This figure is an estimate, entirely dependent on donations. If I raise more money than I need, I will apply it to supplies. If I raise less, I will scale back on supplies and have less art/merchandise to sell at the event. If I receive donations of supplies in lieu of money, I will save what is left after this event to begin planning a special project I hope to launch in the fall.)

Printing and Marketing: To be determined.

Current Fund Raising Total: $2000 (This figure will change as donations of money and supplies are received. Please contact frances@machinepolitick.com for more information with the subject of budget. I am currently working with my bank to set up a secure online system for donations.)

If you are interested in learning more about this movement, my art, or how you can help, please visit www.machinepolitick.com for more information. The Patriot Pony Project and all MachinePolitick endeavors are funded entirely by private individuals. I take pride in the fact that I do not apply for public grants of any kind. I pay for materials and business expenses out of my own pocket and raise money by selling my work. Please spread the word. Your support is greatly appreciated.

In an effort to make this project and the future of American culture as successful as possible, I am asking everyone to pass it on as far and wide as possible. Repost on your blog, send to friends, submit to your local paper and anything else you can think of. I will be cross posting at Liberatchik as well. Please consider joining our Facebook page.

Proposal Letter

That’s not a sentence you will hear from me often. However, I am trying to step out of my comfort zone and learn to be a little less stodgy this year. That doesn’t mean I’ll change my perspective on what is good or bad art. I’m just trying to be a little more objective.

As a general rule, I don’t like performance art. It’s usually some half-baked attempt at shocking the audience or being unintelligible under the pretense of enlightenment. I was happy to find recently that this is not always the case. Here are some photos of the performers I am describing, before I continue with a brief description of the performance.

First, let me say I have a soft spot for circus freaks and gypsies. I’m a bit odd in my own right at times and that’s just the way things are. Typical Conservative I am not. I really wish I had been filming the performance, but I don’t have a video camera. The photos don’t quite capture the character of the performers. The first thing that struck me about this group was the level of detail and amount of effort that  went into designing and constructing the costumes. It appeared that many of the components were either sewn or crocheted. All of them were obviously hand made by the artists. The next thing that struck me was the performances themselves.

These guys have spent a lot of time watching videos of insects and birds. If it weren’t for the human bits sticking out of the costumes, you might have confused them for giant vultures and a mantis dancing around the gallery. It was really cool. Of course, you would have had to be there to really understand, but I hope you’ll take my word for it.

This article will be cross posted at Liberatchik, where you can get more information on The Declarationist Art Movement.

Liberty 1886 is my first painting of 2010. She will be on display at the Tannery Row Artist Colony for the Joy of Six show until April 10. This will be my last traditional rendering of the Statue of Liberty for a while. I am working on my own, modern version, for a series of drawings and paintings I plan to create this year. These works will be on display at the first Liberatchik event which is tentatively scheduled for fall of this year. More information will be available this summer.

Completed: 2010

Medium: Acrylic and mixed media on board.

Price: $1200

Dimensions: 24″ h x 48″ w 2″d

Notes: unframed.

This article is cross posted at Liberatchik

I just want to take a minute this evening to share some drawings with you. They were sent to me recently by a man in Texas who is as concerned about America as I am. Here is a link to his page called, Our American Freedom. Please pass it on.

This post will also be featured at Liberatchik.