Life and times of Alex Schaefer from 2009 to 2013

Originally published 2014

I'm taking over an old post so I can add a "recap" post that I can link to so folks get a timeline of my more "political" work: I never intended to be a political artist. I like plein air landscape painting and nudes and cityscapes. I always say that in an ideal world there would be no political art because we would have good government and peace, but we are so far from that. Starting in 2003, reading alternative news sources online, I started to see a different future than the one being painted in mainstream media outlets; there were reporters out there who were predicting the economic state we are in but they were called "fringe" news and conspiracy crackpots by the mainstream news readers we were supposed to be carefully listening to. Everything that has happened was already spelled out in articles and analysis I was reading years before. The subject of this global crashing economy I find compelling and I feel outraged and shocked; as an artist this eventually comes out into the world. The earliest political statement I could see was in 2004 I started a series of paintings of tract homes that were springing up along the freeways and coming over the tops of hills. I don't have any links on my blog because I started that in 2006, but I did find a couple recently that were unfinished and I've painted foreclosure signs on their lawns: http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2011/09/house-for-sale.html and you can see some of them here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/alex-schaefer-art/5165776735/in/set-72157601014971125 In 2009 an obvious political turn came in my work with a drawing of a parody ad for Chase Bank with a group of kids at the beach drinking Cabernet Beer Bongs http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2009/08/chase-freedom.html http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2014/09/party-like-its-1999.html http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2011/12/chase-freedom.html I started making drawings of money: http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2009/09/money.html I made a wood block print of a dollar bill: http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2009/09/printing-moneyhtml http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2014/09/money-at-hive.html in 2010 I started a series of "fuck the 80's paintings: http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2014/09/fuck-eighties.html http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2011/06/fuck-80s.html http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2014/09/fuck-80s.html http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2012/06/fuck-80s-bummer-games.html Then the gulf oil spill happened http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2010/05/happy-treea-and-oil-spills.html http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2014/09/teton-idyll.html At the end of 2010 I painted my first riot scene: http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2014/09/riot.html In 2011 I started the first of a burning building series for a show at the Hive, this is a painting of the B of A building downtown: http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2011/01/lovers-and-haters.html In July of 2011 I made my first protest video at the Federal Reserve building: http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2014/09/lets-protest.html Later that month I made my first plein air burning bank http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2011/07/chase.html. The second one I did got me the visit from the cops on the street and then detectives at my house 3 weeks later and the rest is art history, I've been a 'terrorist' ever since: http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2011/07/chase-bank-painting-en-plein-air-and.html I was on the Keiser Report over the painting on "The Art of Burning Banks": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FaRVJj3JLmE September 17th was the day Occupy New York broke out and in LA it was called the Day of Rage so I went out that day to paint the Federal Reserve burning: http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2011/09/day-of-rage.html October 1st Occupy LA broke out: http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2014/09/occupy-los-angeles.html Max Keiser tapes a show in Los Angeles, "the Guernica of Financial War": http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2012/05/keiser-report-guernica-of-financial-war.html http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2havcDPMbA In July 2012 I did a chalk protest at Chase Bank in downtown LA and got 12 hours in jail for vandalism http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2012/07/chalk-protest-with-alex-schaefer.html http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKUHw5YLY4g I made another appearance on the Keiser Report, "I did more time than any Bankster": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZtuyK8ZcXI Then I gave Wells Fargo the same treatment: http://alexanderschaefer.blogspot.com/2012/09/alex-schaefer-chalks-wells-fargo.html http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=so9Fzn5W5cs