Skip to content

#UNLOAD: GUNS IN THE HANDS OF ARTISTS

The Fairfield University Art Museum

1 June - 13 October 2018

JOHN SCHUERMAN, Plaything, 2017
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
Installation View of #UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists, The Fairfield University Art Museum
PAUL VILLINSKI, Seed, 2018
Club S+S, SMAC - Distillation, 2018
PAUL VILLINSKI, Celtic, 2018
PAUL VILLINSKI, Calvary, 2018
PAUL VILLINSKI, Never, 2018
MARCUS KENNEY, Girl with Gun, 2015
JOHN SCHUERMAN, Plaything, 2017
GENERIC ART SOLUTIONS, Target: Audience (9mm), 2016
BRIAN BORRELLO, Prosthesis for Instant Manhood, 1996
Rico Gatson, Gun Drop Echo, 2014
MEL CHIN, Aileen, 2015
MARCUS KENNEY, Girl with Gun, 2015
MARCUS KENNEY, Girl with Gun, 2015
ANDREI CODRESCU, A Southern American Story, 2014
Club S+S, SMAC II, 2015
Bradley McCallum, Smelting: A Gun Legacy, 1996-2014
MEL CHIN, Arthur, 2014
R. Luke DuBois, Take a Bullet for This City, 2014
SIDONIE VILLERE, Residual, 2014
GENERIC ART SOLUTIONS, Target: Audience, 2014
RON BECHET, Why! (Is it Easier to Get a Gun than an Education, A Gun Instead of Help?), 2014
Bradley McCallum, Smelting: A Gun Legacy, 1996-2014
GENERIC ART SOLUTIONS, One Hot Month, 2002-2014
SKYLAR FEIN, Kurt Cobong, 2014
Nicholas Varney, Onegin, 2014
Club S+S, SMAC, 2014
RON BECHET, Swords to Ploughshares, 2014
PAUL VILLINSKI, Epitaph, 2014
Robert C. Tannen, Double Barreled Shotgun House, 2014
PAUL VILLINSKI, Mourn, 2014
KATRINA ANDRY, Disappear, 2014
WILLIAM VILLALONGO, Sleeping on Reason, 2014
MARGARET EVANGELINE, Disintegrating Relic, 2014
Robert C. Tannen, Four Barreled Handgun, 2014
Robert C. Tannen, Specie-Men Gun Parts in a Bottle, 2014
PETER SARKISIAN, Recoil, 2014
Jonathan Ferrara, Excalibur No More, 2014
ADAM MYSOCK, The Last Six, Under Six, Murdered by a Gun in the Sixth, 2014
ADAM MYSOCK, Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun (Last Judgment), 2014
MK Guth, Bang, 2014
Deborah Luster, Forms of Correspondence, I. (Yes, No, Goodbye), 2014
Luis Cruz Azaceta, Needle Gun, 2014
Luis Cruz Azaceta, Street Sign, 2014
Luis Cruz Azaceta, Taperuler Gun, 2014
Luis Cruz Azaceta, Carousel, 2014
Neil Alexander, Growing up in a Gun Culture, My Son, 1996-2014
Ted Riederer, Of Guns and Drums, 2014
Luis Cruz Azaceta, Carry On, Drugs, Gun & Teddy Bear, 2014
Luis Cruz Azaceta, Shot, 2014
John Barnes, Marigny Warning, 2014

Press Release

#UNLOAD: Guns in the Hands of Artists

Walsh Gallery

June 1 - October 13, 2018

 

The Fairfield University Art Museum, in partnership with # UNLOAD and the Guns In The Hands of Artists Foundation, is proud to announce the opening of the exhibition, # UNLOAD : Guns in the Hands of Artists. Each piece in the exhibition was created using decommissioned guns, taken off the streets of New Orleans via a gun buyback program and distributed to internationally-known artists. Painters, glass artists, sculptors, photographers, poets, and other artists used the decommissioned firearms to create works of art that address the complex issue of guns and gun violence. The exhibition originated in mid-1990s New Orleans, where a spiking murder rate led artist Brian Borrello to conceive of the first iteration of Guns in the Hands of Artists exhibition by bringing the discussion over the role of guns and gun violence in our society into the realm of art -- art as the language for dialogue and possibly change without the often partisan and polarized politics that surround the issue. Borrello and gallery owner Jonathan Ferrara mounted this exhibition at Positive Space The Gallery in September 1996 in the Lower Garden District of New Orleans. In 2014, Ferrara reorganized the exhibition to feature work by internationally recognized artists. Through their own medium, each artist has used the decommissioned firearms to create works that express a thought, make a statement, open a discussion, and stimulate thinking about guns in our culture.

 

This exhibition is a part of # UNLOAD, an arts-based initiative in Connecticut that seeks to drive consensus around the divisive issue of gun violence. Visit theunloadusa.org website for more information about the many events taking place across the state in 2018 that will engage our communities in vibrant dialogue about this important issue. # UNLOAD and the Fairfield University Art Museum believe in the power of the arts to ignite change in society.

 

In collaboration with the Guns in the Hands of Artists Foundation, # UNLOAD , and the Quick Center for the Arts, the museum hopes to engage partners and collaborators in taking a hard look at the serious public health consequences of gun violence in America. Please check back here often as additional programming is in the works. We hope that the exhibition and the events presented in conjunction with it will offer unique opportunities to engage in the conversation about guns in our society, using art as the catalyst for dialogue.