Artist tabbed for L.A. public mural painted ‘depravities’ of U.S. troops
One of public artist Sandow Birk’s paintings depicts an Army soldier in Iraq ogling a bare-breasted woman in belly dancer or “harem girl” attire, and that painting is titled “The Soldier’s Dream.”
A painting titled “In The Palace of Saddam” shows another soldier in body armor cradling his automatic weapon as he gazes longingly at a seductively posed female soldier, supine on cushions.
Yet a third painting, “The Riddle of the Sphinx,” appears to show a soldier wagging his finger at yet another bare-breasted figure, a winged sphinx come to life, gazing at the pile of skulls behind the soldiers boots.
One painting titled “Hero One” shows a slumbering G.I. Its companion piece, “Hero Two,” is a painting of a wide awake Middle East suicide bomber who looks prepared to detonate. The artist apparently removed the “Hero Two” title from his website after controversy erupted.
The paintings are from the artist’s series dubbed “Depravities of War.” Metro, serving metropolitan Los Angeles and one of the largest public transit agencies in the nation, commissioned Birk to create a mural that would display at the entryway to the VA’s Greater West Los Angeles Health Center, one of the largest hospitals in the nation serving veterans.
The artist was selected without the panelists having seen “Depravities of War,” and with no veteran participation in the artist selection.
It’s a fair statement that veterans who became aware of this are not happy. Several spoke out at a recent special meeting of the Los Angeles Veterans Advisory Commission.
“Just the fact that he was considered for this work shows how brain dead the people are who are running this show,” said Diego Garcia of the ad hoc coalition called the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers. Garcia was among the half-dozen speakers at the meeting decrying the selection process.
I serve on the Los Angeles County Veterans Advisory Commission, but these opinions are mine, and personal. The commission is advisory, so commissioners enjoy no lofty powers, which is OK by me. If something comes up at a monthly meeting that we think the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors should know about, we discuss it. Then we vote on a recommendation.
Low on the pyramid of power as we are, everyone appointed to the commission is a veteran but our agenda is pretty modest against the big map of veteran crises in America, but one thing is certain. Like most people, veterans do not like to feel ignored, or insulted.
A reasonable person, seeing “Depravities of War” might understandably conclude that the artist’s view of soldiers who served in Post-9/11 conflict are displayed in a light to show them to be lecherous and depraved. The suicide bomber was titled as “Hero Two” until that paintings title was scrubbed from the online exhibit.
We still have 17 veterans a day committing suicide. Vietnam and Post 9/11 veterans continue to experience homelessness. Agent Orange-triggered illnesses kill veterans 50 years after Vietnam. The president recently signed “PACT Act” legislation to fund medical help for veterans poisoned by “burn pits” in Afghanistan and Iraq — 20 years after the 9/11 wars began. Troops there were tasked to burn oil-soaked human waste, discarded junk, plastic, solvents, and sometimes body parts. So, it was unhealthy, and troops are still getting sick.
Closer to home, a different Los Angeles advisory commission is trying to make the Department of Veterans Affairs keep its promise to make the VA’s Greater West L.A. Healthcare System serve veterans only, rather than vested Westside interests. The 388-acre VA grounds were promised as a home for vets, not affluent recreationists using VA tennis courts.
It’s in keeping with that promise that the mission of our two commissions converge as sounding boards for redress of grievance. With the Metro station at the VA hospital due to open in 2027, if the project advances, artist Sandow Birk will be paid a hefty commission to create a veterans’ mural.
As for the mural proposal Birk submitted that was the basis for his selection, nothing of the veteran experience in included in his concept art. Instead, it depicts a Navy dirigible of 1930, a ship and a submarine all named “Los Angeles.” Also included is a pastoral scene of Los Angeles that dates back to dinosaurs. Veterans are nowhere to be seen in his concept art.
Metro states it consulted with veterans, but veterans in public hearings aren’t buying that. It appears no veterans were consulted in the Birk commission. The selection panel appears to have had little to no veteran insight. And it was veterans who found out about Birk’s body of work.
This is not over. There will be more hearings. And more questions will be asked. One question would be, “Who thought picking this artist would be a good candidate to paint a mural about veterans?” Had they seen his art?
Editor’s note: Dennis Anderson, a licensed clinical social worker, serves on the Los Angeles County Veterans Advisory Commission. An Army veteran, he deployed to Iraq with the California National Guard to cover the war as an embedded journalist reporting for newspapers and Editor & Publisher magazine.
