Jesse Richards - Stuckism

Stuckism

Richards is affiliated with the Stuckist art movement in 2001 and founded a gallery as the first Stuckism center in the United States in 2002, helping to organize shows. The center opened its doors with a show entitled "We Just Wanna Show Some Fucking Paintings."

In 2003, an anti-war "Clown Trial of President Bush" took place outside the New Haven Federal Courthouse, in order to "highlight the fact that the Iraq war does not have the support of the United Nations, thus violating a binding contract with the UN". It was staged by local Stuckist artists dressed in clown costume, led by Richards with Nicholas Watson and Tony Juliano. One of the participants was a public defender for the state of Connecticut.

Simultaneously the Stuckism center opened a War on Bush show, including work from Brazil, Australia, Germany and the UK, while the London ; equivalent staged a War on Blair show. Richards said the original intention of a straightforward art show to an anti-war show had been changed after a phone discussion with Stuckism founder, Charles Thomson. Richards told The Yale Herald, "Duchamp would go over to the Yale University Art Gallery and he would say, 'This is crap,' and he would go paint a picture."

Also in 2003, Richards was an exhibitor in the UK show, Stuck in Wednesbury at Wednesbury Museum & Art Gallery, the first Stuckist show in a public gallery, and in The Stuckists Summer Show at the Stuckism International Gallery, London.

In 2004, Richards was one of eight artists in the "International Stuckists" section of The Stuckists Punk Victorian show at the Walker Art Gallery during the Liverpool Biennial. He said of his exhibited work, Nightlife: "This came out of heavy drinking and loneliness. New Haven's social scene is entirely going to bars, so it was my only way to meet new people."

Richards reviewed the Biennial and the Stuckist show, where he found Joe Machine's My Grandfather Will Fight You, "one of the best Stuckist paintings. Machine's work is the epitome of raw, real expressive painting." He said that Stuckist Photographer Andy Bullock's work was "silly installation photography" which was "trying to be trendy."

In 2005, 160 paintings from the Walker Art Gallery show, including one by Richards, were offered as a donation to the Tate gallery, but rejected by Sir Nicholas Serota, because "We do not feel that the work is of sufficient quality in terms of accomplishment, innovation or originality of thought to warrant preservation in perpetuity in the national collection".

In 2005, Richards was a co-ordinator of, and participated in, Addressing the Shadow and Making Friends with Wild Dogs: Remodernism, the first Remodernism exhibition in the US to include work from all of the Remodernist groups, including the Stuckists, the Defastenists, Remodernist Film and Photography, and Stuckism Photography. The show took place at the CBGB 313 gallery.

In 2006, Richards was one of the artists in The Triumph of Stuckism, a show at Liverpool John Moores University Hope Street Gallery, curated by Naive John at the invitation of Professor Colin Fallows, Chair of Research at Liverpool School of Art and Design, and part of the Liverpool Biennial 2006.

Richards left the Stuckist movement in 2006.