Anne Kelly  (00:13):

This is art Mira. I’m your host Anne Kelly today’s featured guest is Croix Williamson. He is a vision artist. We also have back on the show as a guest host Talia. K. If you saw episode four, you’ve met Talia. If you didn’t, you should go back and watch. In the meantime, Talia is a singer songwriter and art lawyer. Welcome Croix. Welcome Talia.

Criox Williamson (00:45):

Hello. How’s it going?

Anne Kelly  (00:47):

So we’re all in Santa Fe,New Mexico but all in different places, cuz the world’s real weird right now, but um, we’re in Santa Fe. Are you

Criox Williamson (00:55):

Croix I’m south Santa Fe,  New Mexico by the best Western plus at my studio. <laugh>

Anne Kelly  (01:02):

And Talia, where are you at? I’m in the Casa Solana area. Troy and I met in college way back when and so the, the shows actually named after an art show that we used to have in college art and the raw where we’d show unfinished art. So this is, um, not the same as that, but I wanted it to have kind of the same spirit. And I don’t remember specifically, but you must have been at a bunch of those shows Croix.

Criox Williamson (01:34):

I was definitely there at every single one of those shows. Yes, it was fun.

Anne Kelly  (01:37):

Of course you were. Did you usually bring art or, or make it at the show? I did

Criox Williamson (01:42):

Both definitely did both. I remember specifically art in the raw where I was experimenting with melting crowns and I was painting a painting with melting crowns. That was fun. That was pretty cool. And I’ve never, but I haven’t experimented with that again since then, but yeah. And then we also, I remember, I remember playing stump, the old blacksmith game. I think Jeremy Thomas, he he’s the one that brought a stump. And so you flip the, the hammer and it catch it in your hand if you catch it and then you swing and knock a NA your neighbor’s nail in whoever, whoever got their nail knocked in first was outta the game or something like that.

Anne Kelly  (02:20):

But I dunno if I can play that, but that sounds kind of amazing. <laugh> it’s a drinking game.

Criox Williamson (02:24):

I wanted to

Anne Kelly  (02:25):

Know how you both met each other in college. That that’s actually a fun story. This is literally the first day that we’d moved to the dorms and I was just walking around and I heard someone playing the misfits and it was Croix and I like ran and I popped my head in his room and I was like, this fits you’re awesome. And I started running down the hallway and he came back out and was like, who are you? And then, and then we became friends after that friends

Criox Williamson (02:53):

Never. I vaguely do remember that.

Anne Kelly  (02:55):

And then we lived together in, in what we called the big house out in Senga. That

Criox Williamson (03:01):

Was crazy time.

Anne Kelly  (03:03):

That that was a fun house. Everybody that lived in the house was an artist, but you were paintingg and Gina was painting and we had this giant living room that was all tile. Thank God, cuz both you and Gina would have like 10 going at a time. And um, yeah, there had been carpet that could have been real bad.

Criox Williamson (03:24):

Yeah. Yeah. That was when I was pouring paint and scraping it and making really trippy stuff. I don’t have any of those paintings left. They’re all sold to different people, but yeah, well I do remember when I was experimenting with, uh, resin epoxy on a painting and it never dried in the garage, I was gonna

Anne Kelly  (03:43):

Bring that off actually.

Criox Williamson (03:45):

<laugh> uh, that was terrible. And then of course I scraped off all the resin except there was a thin layer of resin and I just stuck it outside and it dried immediately like in the sun, I guess it was activated by the sun, but I was goofball and didn’t realize how that worked anyways, like cuz just in the darkness and the garage, it just never dried and it, oh that smell. Remember, I, I mean it must have been like a or longer. Yeah, it was probably longer than a

Anne Kelly  (04:20):

Really cool painting.

Criox Williamson (04:21):

Yeah. I know actually, you know what, I painted a painting over that and actually Sean has that painting that I painted over and because it was resin, the resin is chipping off. So that painting is chipping,

Anne Kelly  (04:34):

But yeah, you, you and Jean literally have 10 canvases each out and both of you would be running from canvas to canvas. Just, just painting.

Speaker 3 (04:42):

Sounds like an interesting process of going from painting to painting from canvas to canvas instead of focusing on

Criox Williamson (04:48):

One. Yeah. That’s kinda, is that how you work? That’s yeah, I mean I still do that. Yeah. Interesting. I usually I’m working on a bunch of stuff at the same time ton of stuff. Yeah.

Anne Kelly  (05:00):

Do you have any out now that that you’re currently working on?

Criox Williamson (05:04):

Well, yeah, I can show you some, uh, I can show you, uh, this painting that I’m working on and I’ll show you some drawings and, and uh, all sorts of stuff. So, so this is a painting I’m working on right now and it’s really challenging cuz I’m trying kind of a different method kind of messing with color theory and it’s not so much lines. Cause a lot of my artwork has a lot to do with the lines, you know, and there is still the black lines here, but I’m trying to experiment with getting, you know, with the different plain colors playing off each other. And since I haven’t painted with acrylic like this in so long, been very challenging. So I’m still working on this one and you know, and I got this one I’m I, I started and haven’t finished,

Anne Kelly  (05:49):

You know, that reminds me a little bit of some of your Sumi drawings.

Criox Williamson (05:52):

Yeah, yeah, yeah. This cuz I do. I do these drawings in these cities constantly, uh, in these weird city skates with little Hills kind of cartoony. Uh, and these are actually, these are all, um, spray paint paintings that I haven’t figured. I haven’t come to a conclusion with them yet. So they’re kind of, and, and they’re a little different, you know, you know, and this, this too is, well, I have not come to a conclusion with yet. Maybe I will, maybe I won’t, but uh, I don’t know, you know, that’s kind of how it goes. Um,

Anne Kelly  (06:27):

So you usually hang them up for a while, spend a little time with them and

Criox Williamson (06:32):

Sometimes they they’re quick. Sometimes they take time and sometimes I, I never finish it, but <laugh>, it seems like, and this is a well that’s already finished. That is a finish that and, and this is a, a symbol piece. Well,

Anne Kelly  (06:47):

So how, how do you know when they’re done? I just

Criox Williamson (06:50):

Know, you just know when they’re done, this is a finished piece. Uh, and it’s kind of like in the cartoony city dialogue city, you know, and this one’s done, you know, and that’s kind of different, little different messing with different styles, you know, kind of a messier,

Anne Kelly  (07:07):

A challenge that a lot of artists have knowing when they’re done. Like, is it, when do you stop? Um, but I think it’s also like, how do you know when you love a piece of art and I always defer to you just know it when you see it. So mm-hmm, <affirmative>, it’s like,

Criox Williamson (07:24):

Yeah,

Anne Kelly  (07:24):

You’re lucky to have kinda that experience with your own artwork, you know? Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (07:30):

What, what would you say your influences are? I feel like an MCs or vibe to some of your stuff. Is that offensive?

Criox Williamson (07:37):

Uh, no. I mean, I, I love MCs. Sure. I mean, who doesn’t love MCs? Sure. I am influenced by all the art I see in the world. Like I love art. I, I even collect some, even though I don’t usually I do like trays with people or I got a couple little, I got pieces sprint. My, some of my friends’ pieces here, but, um, and I’m always looking at art, always looking at online, always looking all around. So I’m influence by all sorts of people. Um, from, you know, I, I love graffiti art. I love, uh, see I’m in, um, MCs or course, but also like lately I’ve been thinking about and pondering like Louis eon and like, uh, LeVonte a lot and that sculptural work, but it’s all, it’s all related, you know, to me. So I also look at a lot of like LeBus woods. I think that’s how they say his name. He’s like an architect and does really incredible or he’s, he’s not around anymore, but he did all these, a wild, architectural conceptual art pieces that were just off the charts. I don’t know. There’s a lot of people I could go on and on. We’re

Anne Kelly  (08:50):

Actually doing some graffiti pieces on a wall, outside your studio, or you’re going to, you mentioned the other day,

Criox Williamson (08:57):

I’m gonna make, I lo I love doing murals. I’m gonna make myself a graffiti mural wall that I can just paint murals on to get faster with spray paint. Cuz I love spray paint. There’s not like a lot of walls to spray paint here in Santa Fe. Like there was in Austin, we had a graffiti because that’s where I ’em originally. We had a graffiti wall, so I would go spray paint there all the time. And uh, and I’ve done some murals here and there for people, but I don’t get too many opportunities to do that. And uh, Yeah. And I don’t well, yeah, I’m like I, yeah, I never, I mean I have done little bit of illegal graffiti, but now I don’t really get into that cuz that’s not my goal is uh, you know, I, I like to make pieces and not run from the cops, you know, have to worry about it, you know, cuz that’s, uh, that’s just, you know, I’m, I’m not in it for the rush like that per se like some people are and, and I think that’s cool, whatever you want, you know? Um, but yeah,

Anne Kelly  (10:01):

You wing in spray paint versus acrylic paint. How, how is that physically different?

Criox Williamson (10:07):

Oh, well, you know, spray paint is so much faster in a lot of ways. Um, you know, because you, it, but it’s, it’s, it is definitely challenging, like to get the small details, which, you know, some of those guys have such incredible coordination with that spray paint, you know what I mean? They get the details, which I’m working on that a lot of times I use like, uh, stencils tape and stuff to get nice little corn and, and then I use like, like I cut out shapes, you know, and, and stack ’em on there to get the details, you know, and I did buy an airbrush so that I could experiment with that, but I haven’t spent very much time messing with that. So, um, it’s definitely a different experience. What I love about it is, uh, cuz my, I do, I, I like the gestural kind of flow, you know?

Criox Williamson (11:05):

So like I’m very gestural so I can move with a spray paint, uh, you know, these big, long strokes and get these nice lines and, and it feels real good. You know, it’s like, I’ll, I’ll almost like, I guess it would kind of, you could kind of think of it like Tai Chi or something, you know, just like doing these cool lines and shapes, you know, is so fun and satisfying to me. Uh, I it’s for my style the way I do it, I like, it’s kind of really fast and gestural went and spray painted at the graffiti park in, um, Austin, Texas. And uh, it was, it was so freaking satisfying, like this paint coming outta your fingertip, you know, and you could just, and I was like, oh my God, it kind of just blew my mind open and I can’t wait to start painting with it again. It’s been a while since I moved to Santa Fe. And so yeah.

Anne Kelly  (12:05):

Well you said you’ve got that wall back, so

Criox Williamson (12:07):

Yeah, I’m, I will be, uh, but I haven’t built it yet. I, I got just a, I don’t wanna spray paint on the wall that I’m gonna the wall, so I don’t destroy the property that I’m living at.

Anne Kelly  (12:18):

Uh, very adult of you <laugh> yeah,

Criox Williamson (12:21):

I try to be, uh, responsible.

Anne Kelly  (12:24):

Right. Hey, do you have any metal sculptures? We haven’t really talked about the metal sculptures. Oh

Criox Williamson (12:30):

Yeah. So I have some, some, uh, a couple of new pieces. So here is a couple of different metal sculptures that I have made recently. Yeah. These are welded steel sculptures.

Anne Kelly  (12:46):

What, what kind of welding is this known as

Criox Williamson (12:49):

These two are MI welding? That’s the, that’s the welding with the gun and it was a wire feed kind of the easiest way to weld, I guess they would say so there’s MIG and stick and TIG. This is more, I, this is 20 gauge. So it’s really thin. So welding it with a MIG. Welder’s pretty ridiculous cuz there’s a lot of grinding involved just recently got a T weld so that I can make more cuz my rolling machine is a hand powered one and it’s not strong enough to roll more two gauge or something or 20 gauge I guess. So. And that’s how I roll those forms to make ’em nice and smooth. If I don’t, if, if I don’t use the rolling machine, I have to use a hammer and which I’ll go, I’ll show you what I do to make those. When I, I use a hammer with two bars, when we go into my shop, I’ll show you, and this is an older piece.

Criox Williamson (13:46):

This is all interconnected Conal and constructions. So these are all these cones that are slotted and I slotted them together, ed them and grinded over. So, and, and you, and so these are all loose from each other, but they’re stuck together permanently. Of course. Um, it was pretty fun to make it, but it really difficult. I caught all this by hand, you know, and I’ll show you some examples. So you can see the process of how I made that in the other room, in this room over here. I have. Yeah. So, so it’s slotted together like that. So I could take this thing completely apart. It’s kind of difficult cuz it’s a three quarter circle, so it’s kind of hard to get it past, but I can get it apart. And I have some, I have a really small one that it, I can take apart completely cuz it’s a half circle.

Criox Williamson (14:39):

So this, so that’s kind of fun. And then this over here, so you can kind of see right here. So this is a, this I’ll put it in this light. So this is a half circle and these, so these come apart and this is made outta bras. See, that’s very MCES right there. <laugh> see. Yeah. These are kind of these crazy complicated things I like to make. And I just, and I have some in my, I have a gallery up in Colorado and called um, uh, sea waters gallery and she has my larger, I have a larger version of this over there. Uh, these are some other sculptures. See, I like to make stuff really difficult. So this is 80 something pieces. It’s all TIG welded and grinded and uh, and it’s, and it’s took forever, you know, cuz I like to make my life difficult and then this one is kind of fun.

Criox Williamson (15:39):

So this is a, if you can see it. So this is a sculpture, uh, I made outta one inch plate and I pressed it. It’s two spirals together, but I fused them to together so that it looks like it’s made out of one continuous piece. And I, and I cut back into the weld. So you can’t tell where it’s welded basically. So it’s kind of like an impossible thing, kind of an impossible spiral. So, so if you see it, it goes around and around and back under and then comes around here. So it’s kind of fun and I’ve made some larger pieces they’re gone now and I sold them, but this is actually, this is the, I think this is the last of those, which I’m gonna make some more soon. So I, is that a thing you

Anne Kelly  (16:33):

Do smaller version and then expand it into a larger

Criox Williamson (16:37):

Eventually I want to make a large, really large version, but actually oftentimes like I, for this one down here, actually, even for this one, I made a larger one first cuz, and then I made a small one. Uh, yeah, it’s kind of funny cuz I always for it a little too much go for the bigger piece. And then I realized I had to rethink it. Like the first one of those I made actually came out really gr good in a way, but some of my calculations were off. So it was really like kind of, it came together really in a, in a weird way, slightly, really tight. And it almost looked like a, like a piece of a large bug, you know, that was lying on the ground. And you know what I mean? That, that maybe like a, like a well segment of it.

Criox Williamson (17:28):

And it was really kind of crazy that one is that one resides in New Zealand now, uh, at my old art dealer, she bought it from me and I should show you these other things, paintings and other sculptures. If these I made in creed, this one I made in Austin a while ago, this is spray paint. See how it’s all, uh, Matt did it with masking tape and mm-hmm <affirmative> and uh, stencils, this one I made live, like I did a live painting session. Sometimes they come together really fast. This came together so fast and then this one and then these, these are some other works, which these are all digital paintings. So if you can see it, oh, and I guess these are all my website too. Normally

Anne Kelly  (18:19):

We let it hold up to Instagram by now, but you’ve got some interesting things.

Criox Williamson (18:24):

Well, I like to make my space colorful and kind of a, an, you know, I, cause I like to live in the painting, you know what I mean? So that’s why I got so many colored lights. I love colored lights, some color combinations work really well for me in particular. So like I see it and I’m like, holy. You know, that is it. You know, it’s uh, kind of an intuitive thing. I think, you know what, I <affirmative> the certain patterns, color combinations, just the composition, right? Just like in songs, some stuff goes together. Well, some stuff doesn’t right.

Anne Kelly  (19:00):

I’ve, I’ve always deferred to intuition in terms of what I like, what I don’t like. I know it when I see it. And sometimes you can’t even articulate it for or years or

Criox Williamson (19:11):

Ever. Yeah, for sure.

Anne Kelly  (19:13):

If own artwork by any artist living or dead, any price range, no limits. Yeah.

Criox Williamson (19:24):

What would it be? Yeah. What would it be? I really like this artist rhyme. Uh, he’s a incredible graffiti artist. When I first saw his work, it kind of just blew my freaking mind because he’s just so gestural and like, but so tight. You’re just, if, if look him up, I love his stuff. I would have a piece of his, I would also have probably a Louis neon piece. There’s just one in particular. I really love, it looks like it’s made out of a stone. It’s black stone. It looks like it’s made out of basalt. And for some reason like that piece, I don’t know. I’ve been looking at it. I keep, I keep, uh, looking her up just to see that piece probably because I have a big chunk of a big basaltic river rock that I got to, to do stone lifting with. It’s a little heavy for me now, or I might carve it. I don’t know. Haven’t decided <laugh>

Anne Kelly  (20:23):

Anyways exercise or stone lifting

Criox Williamson (20:27):

Thing. Yeah. Yeah. It’s stone lifting is they call it Atlas stone. It’s like a strong man thing, you know? Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, working with iron and all that kind of stuff, you wanna be, you want to keep your strength. So I do stuff like lifting stuff to keep my strength, even though I don’t do it enough to like be a big strong person, but trying to get back into it, I’ve been kind of off lately. But my friend I had, my friend is the one that’s kind of got me into it one day, cuz we went down to the, um, uh, Diablo canyon and he was showing me about this rock lifting and we were out there lifting rocks and I felt like I was like a, in the really old days, like how people would work out back in row room mountains. Yeah. That’s,

Speaker 3 (21:17):

That’s so cooler

Criox Williamson (21:17):

Than the gym. So it’s so beautiful out there and incredible like landscape and you’re lifting rocks. It’s kind of, it’s, it’s a little safer in a away than rock climbing cuz you can’t fall. Of course you could screw your back up. You gotta be careful, but, but it’s to also kind of helps you strengthen your back, you know, and to Greg

Speaker 3 (21:36):

Robertson too, who is also on your show,

Anne Kelly  (21:38):

We should do like a, a rock lifting art in the raw

Criox Williamson (21:42):

I’ll bet you, he can lift stones for sure. So I was gonna take you to my shop, my middle. Okay. So we’re going in my backyard. It’s gonna get dark here.

Anne Kelly  (21:56):

So, so while we’re walking there tell you if you could have any piece of art in the world.

Speaker 3 (22:01):

I would say, uh, I would love to have a piece from William Eggleston or Agnes Martin or Juliet cliff who is actually more accessible than those other two artists. Um, I found her a couple years ago. She’s a sculptural artist and I just love her stuff. She’s French. What

Anne Kelly  (22:19):

About you? I gotta say if I could have a piece by MC Esher that, that I would be pretty excited about that

Speaker 3 (22:26):

To be perfect. Yeah. That’d be a good investment too.

Anne Kelly  (22:28):

Yeah. Yeah. So we’re going with MC Esher for sure. We’re going to photography, man. Ray is, is one of my favorite photographers of all times and I definitely cannot afford one of his, um, pieces. So yeah man Ray, cuz we’re

Criox Williamson (22:46):

Making it up. This, this is my metal shop and I was gonna show you this piece that I am working on right now, it’s gonna be a rainstorm and see the cloud’s not there on the top, but you can kind of see, I got it kind of to the slant, like it’s coming down with the wind. And so this is my studio. It’s a, it’s a big mess. I just finished the project in here. And also it’s just a mess because it’s really tight. Um, and you’re

Anne Kelly  (23:14):

Using it.

Criox Williamson (23:16):

Yes. And I haven’t swept and <laugh> so don’t judge me anyways. That’s the way it is. And this is another piece doing a little different thing with this thing. You’ll see when I finish it, but I’m messing with some different, be all welded up and then I’m gonna cut it and stagger it and give it some crazy dimensions, some different kind of treatment. So it’s, it’s an experiment.

Anne Kelly  (23:40):

So is there a final Tina for these?

Criox Williamson (23:43):

Yeah, these, I mean I usually black and I’m and see you see the dings on this cuz this is thicker. I can’t roll it in my roller. See, I do that with a hammer and I have a piece of, and then I, I hammer it in between this thing. So, so hammer it in here, like to get it round. So it takes time, a little bit of hammering, just cold, cold forging, which is actually supposedly it’s terrible idea, but <laugh> but anyways, anyway. Yeah. And so, and then I have all the, these other projects, pieces and stuff that I’ve never finished and that someday I’ll finish that little piece back there and you know, other pieces, crazy things. That’s where the magic happens in my mess. I love it to the inside your studio. I love it. Next summer. I’ll be putting, I’ll be building an awning.

Anne Kelly  (24:48):

It’s looking pretty sweet right now. I gotta say,

Criox Williamson (24:51):

Yeah, I just need room. Well I have a, I have all the parts to make an English wheel and I really want to do that so I can form do some more organic forms. So

Anne Kelly  (25:04):

What is an English wheel?

Criox Williamson (25:05):

Use it to make fenders and stuff like that to get those round. And what it does is it’s, it’s a machine that is used to stretch the metal in that’s oh, compound curve or, well, that’s one

Anne Kelly  (25:17):

Of the interesting things about, about welding over the years is it’s had this artistic application, but you know, it’s used in cars, it’s bridge. You had a metal shop in, in Austin that you owned or co-owned

Criox Williamson (25:32):

I was business partners in it. Yeah. We made, uh, we did a lot of architectural iron work. Um, and we did a lot of, uh, so architectural stuff. We would also do like, like, uh, just custom, you know, things that people wanted or some times people would come to us for like, cuz they had some kind of invention or kind of thing that they wanted made this kind of custom, all sorts of stuff. We did a just, uh, we, we did a lot of signs too, signs, metal signs for people. Um, and we did a lot of handrails gates, lots of fans gates and it was a, an experience. So we, me and my friend, uh, Ryan, Scott Aarons, we started that business shoot. I don’t know what year it was, but I was, we were, we, when I left, I had, we had been working on it for about five years mm-hmm <affirmative> and really, I would say Ryan was he owned it because he did all that stuff that I couldn’t, I didn’t want to do. So he was the big dog, you know, <laugh>

Anne Kelly  (26:40):

Like the administrative stuff. Yeah. He,

Criox Williamson (26:43):

He was very, I mean he is very responsible and good at the administrative stuff. And also like, he was really good at explaining PE to people, how to do stuff. And you know, like he was really good to at working with people. I was challenge at that part, like running guys, running the crew, I was very challenged. I’m I’m, I’m a really good fabricator. And I mostly, by the end of it, I ended up being like the finisher and you know, I did a lot of painting and clear coating and, and grinding and finishing out, trying to make everything look good, you know, in the end, you know, you guys, you want them welding, you want them doing all the, the rough stuff and then I would finish it, you know, like, and patinas

Anne Kelly  (27:35):

And collaboration is kind of awesome. I mean, everybody’s gonna have different skillsets and if you can kind of get with other people that have have different skillsets, you can kind of make something beautiful. And yeah. You know, maybe you’re, you’re more talented at, at X aspects of the thing. And then he, he was maybe more the, the business side of it, but together he’s,

Criox Williamson (28:02):

He’s also an incredible fabric himself. He actually went to welding school. See, I went to art school. So I, I mean, I, I learned a lot from working with him cuz he like, he’s the kind of guy you could go, you know, you could ask him a technical question and he will have the answer for you. He’s got that kind of brain that storage, that kind of technical knowledge, you know? So yeah. So it was really nice to have somebody like that to work with. Cause I just kind of go for it even though I don’t know how to do it, you know what I mean? I just try to figure it out, but you know, I could always go to him and tell, ask him, you know, oh, how would I do that? You know what I mean? Or, or what is the right? What is the right order of, of things to do? You know? So it like, it was really, it was really a great learning experience working with that guy. And um, cuz he is just like, you know, one of those people, you can just pick his brain, he’ll explain it to you six different ways and you’ll, you know, and you’ll get it, you know, <laugh>,

Anne Kelly  (29:08):

You know. Yeah. But I think a lot, you know, and, and that, why, why is what kind of, why I go back to the collaboration sometimes there’s people who are really good at explaining things and then there’s other people, um, like you that you’re just gonna do it. You’re just gonna go for it. You’re like, I don’t know if making a giant version of this makes any sense, but you’re just gonna do it. And I think some people are gonna be held back by, by fear or I don’t know how to do this or, or that type of thing. So I think it’s all valuable and, and we’re all different and yeah, yeah,

Criox Williamson (29:43):

For sure. Like, yeah. When I was making this thing, I realized, see, this is another example of me not making a small version first <laugh> and I, I just made this giant one and I’m like, God, why didn’t I, God, I could have worked out something, you know, <laugh> but I just went for it and made the big one, but I am, I still want to make a smaller one. I got some, I got a little footprint to make a small, really dramatic one. I am gonna make a tabletop cloud. Um, once I finish this thing, you know, but I got so many projects on, on the horizon.

Anne Kelly  (30:26):

So I geeked out a little bit earlier before we started recording. Are you familiar with this, the iron pillar in Delhi? Because it was apparently erected in India in three 10 ad is one of the earliest examples of welding. And I mean, I am no expert, but as I understood it and I could be wrong, uh, the guy wanted to create this particular piece of art. And I think again, don’t quote me, I think welding was kind of born out of his desire to create this pillar.

Criox Williamson (31:05):

Oh wow.

Anne Kelly  (31:06):

And that just reminded me looking at your, your, your rank pillar.

Criox Williamson (31:12):

Oh yeah. Um, I have not, I have not seen that, but I really want to see that. That sounds exceptional. Yeah.

Anne Kelly  (31:21):

It’s like everything. We kind of ended up talking about the show dates way far back. I mean three 10 ad. Wow. We in 2020.

Criox Williamson (31:31):

Yeah. That’s a long, that’s a good, that’s a long time ago. <laugh> that’s cool that they, I wonder how they were, I guess I wonder how they were welding back then. Well, who knows, you know, Andy, is that in

Anne Kelly  (31:44):

India? India. Mm-hmm <affirmative>

Criox Williamson (31:46):

Yeah. I mean, I always, I watch a lot of stuff about India that’s that place is so, and they’ve been doing that stuff for so long mm-hmm <affirmative> and it’s mind boggling. Yeah. I seen some really crazy things over there.

Anne Kelly  (32:03):

You can’t help it. Holly’s episode. I started looking back at the history of, of ukuleles and learned some interesting things and um, I love that in. I can’t, I can’t help myself <laugh>

Criox Williamson (32:17):

Yeah. Well, there’s so much to learn about. I, I, I watched a lot of documentaries and look at ancient art from all over the world and yeah, I love that stuff. Actually. I got a friend, he works at a gallery here in town and it, they got like meso American art, pre-Columbian art and all that. And this it’s cool to just go in there and check it out and, and, uh, want, you just want those things <laugh> super, yeah. Yeah. Super ancient stone carving as you’re like, oh, I want that, you know

Anne Kelly  (32:54):

Yeah. The history of what, what you’re, what we’re doing well doing, came from.

Criox Williamson (33:01):

Yeah.

Anne Kelly  (33:03):

And so, so, so Talia, one of her passions on top of music, she’s an lawyer that is interested in art cases, uh, an art lawyer among other types, um, different, different kind of art related cases that are going on. And, and you said, and we talked about a few of those on the last show. Um, yeah. Happened with those cases,

Speaker 3 (33:30):

Nothing in further development on the ones that we talked about, but there was a couple interesting ones. And I thought because the, there is, uh, some graffiti elements to your work. I was just reviewing this one landmark case. I don’t know if you guys have ever heard of it called five points, five points was this artist, um, basically this artist colony in, uh, Brooklyn or in Queens actually. And it was a SP building complex and the landlord allowed all of these different artists to, uh, graffiti everything like E every part of the exterior and probably interior cuz a lot of them lived there was graffiti and he allowed this for years and years and years. And then one day it kind of reminded me of uh, um, of the situation that you guys lived in, in college, but on, in a, on a bigger scale and one day all of the artists woke up and he had whitewashed the entire building complex in the night, destroying all of the graffiti, you know, without warning and uh, his argument as it’s my building, it’s my property.

Speaker 3 (34:44):

But we do have this act called the visual artist rights act. The artist used to Sue him and they actually won jury, um, found for the artist. And then the judge actually, uh, gave them a, an over $6 million verse, which was huge. And this kind of, you know, begs a lot of questions about, you know, the difference between graffiti and mural work is the, the permission element, right? So there was permission given here. So, you know, we’re not talking about illegal works of art and the visual artist rights act protects on the exterior of buildings where you have to give the artist notice, you have to try to allow them some time to remove it if they can, or at least preserve it in photographs. And so the, uh, landlord appealed this case to the us Supreme court and they just declined to hear the case, which means it’s over the landlord has to pay the 6.75 million. And um, yeah, so that was a really big win for, um, muralists and artists around America. And how did that go on for see 2013 is when he whitewashed and then 2018 is when the appeals court ruled. So it’s been a while. I mean, these things go on forever.

Criox Williamson (36:10):

Sounds like that guy was a super Dick

Speaker 3 (36:13):

Super Dick. So what these cases do is send message to landlords, uh, to property commercial property holders all over the country. And it kind of sends a double message, right? It sends a double message of like, don’t give permission to paint on your walls, but it also sends a message that if you do, you know, Hey, yeah, you can go ahead and paint a mural on that. You can’t just go in the and paint over it or destroy it. Um, you have to take measures to contact the artists and see if they can remove it. If you’re destroying the building, see if they can remove it, you know, or at least murals are often hard to remove. So sometimes it’s not possible, but they could at least try and they could have been notified.

Anne Kelly  (36:55):

You’ve said it’s kind of rare generally also that, um, the artist would even come forward. Most, most of the times his tenants would’ve just gone. Okay, well he’s the landlord and they wouldn’t have actually taken action.

Speaker 3 (37:09):

That’s right. Yeah. His, his problem was that there were so many of them, right. And they all got a single attorney. It’s not great money for, uh, you know, the, a number of artists that were a part of this case. But the precedent that it sets is pretty big, how many artists, um, I would have to look it up, but I mean, it, this was a sprawling building complex and there are a lot of, um, you know, artists work lift spaces. So it’s, there’s a ton of them. The judge was the one he handed down a hundred page opinion, counted each artwork, which ended up being 45 works that were destroyed and awarded a damages about on each one, which is pretty cool too. So yeah, it’s a, it’s a good decision. It’s solid. And the, the Supreme court decided not to review it. And you know, we have, we have really strong, um, versus other countries strong copyright and fair use law, but like European countries have better moral rights than we do.

Speaker 3 (38:12):

So, you know, the there’s moral rights in this case, you know, the, the right to prevent your work from being destroyed, the, to associate your name with your work or to remove the association of your name with a work. Um, and there’s another one that’s just sort of similar in Norway right now, just kind of looking at the contrast. The Norwegian government has started to tear down this, this old, pretty historic building in, uh, Oslo that had Picassos two Picasso murals in it. And they did remove those murals and move them to another place. And there’s been a ton of protests about this, cuz they’re saying that the building, um, is brutalist architecture, which is concrete and that the building should be preserved. And that P Picasso intended it was a site specific artwork and that the, the artwork should not be separated from the building that they belong together.

Speaker 3 (39:18):

And the building was destroyed in a, um, a car bomb, uh, terrorist car bomb back in 2000, uh, 2011. And so they see it as like a, a symbol of you’re tearing down a building that should be a symbol of democracy. Right. So that’s kind of interesting too, because, you know, with the, like the, the five points case that we, we just talked about, the protection is around the artwork, but in this case, the, the request is for a protection of a building. And so, you know, in like in the us, we have protection for architectural designs, but not necessarily the buildings and those designs. Can you, can you say you can’t tear this down because, because it’s a work of art, right. Cuz there’s a functional element to that. So kind of interesting. I thought I’d bring those two cases up.

Anne Kelly  (40:15):

Yeah. Super interest.

Criox Williamson (40:17):

That’s cool.

Anne Kelly  (40:19):

So Croix, if you painted a mural at the college of Santa Fe and they wanted to move it, would you feel strongly about that?

Criox Williamson (40:30):

I painted a mural in creed, Colorado in this, uh, restaurant bar and it was really, you know, my, my crazy style and then <laugh>, and eventually they, they, uh, took most of it out except for a chunk of it because all cuz in creed, that’s a lot of old people live there and they kind of like it traditional and Western, you know, and they <laugh>, they thought it was too outright ages and I had to let go of that. Uh, and that’s, and I mean, it, it does not feel that good, but what are you gonna do? You know, I don’t know, it’s on a wall in somebody’s restaurant and the, uh, you know, the young people liked it, but the, some of the there’s a lot of like traditional, you know, um, keep it the same. Cause it’s kind of got this minor history, like it’s a mining town, it’s rough neck cowboy, you know what I mean?

Criox Williamson (41:30):

And my painting is real wild and abstract and stylized. So, you know, I don’t know, uh, I’ve dealt with this, so yeah, I mean, it, it hurts for a minute, but I let go, whatever. I mean, those kind of things are kind of temporary. It’s a temporal experience. It was awesome. It was fun to paint. And I took a lot of pictures, uh, the, uh, owner of the restaurant, he kept a big chunk of it. He and framed it in his house. So it’s kind of cool. Actually I painted a mural in a friend’s house in Arizona and the guy that owned the house, cut the <laugh> cut the mural out and kept it when he sold the house. <laugh>

Anne Kelly  (42:16):

I would say that’s a big honor, honestly. So there, there, it was maybe still is actually a mural by a famous graffiti artist on the college campus. Uh, shepherd ferry is that shepherd ferry mural still there does anybody know?

Speaker 3 (42:31):

I hope it is. That’s a good question.

Anne Kelly  (42:35):

Yeah. I think we need to find out and

Speaker 3 (42:38):

Disarray. So who

Anne Kelly  (42:39):

Knows actually, um, so David Cheba, he was one of the, he was the head of the photo department there and I think he might have actually had something to do with that mural. I’m not exactly sure, but he’s, he’s gonna be on the show next week. So I’ll ask him, but I hope it’s still there and if it’s not there, it better be somewhere, probably worth a lot of money. There was the Arcosanti um, or, uh, not Arcosanti Paula. So Larry amphitheater, Paul created Arcosanti they had that Paul. So Larry amphitheater at the, um, that other college in town that they, that they tore down or were gonna tear down or do they tear it

Speaker 3 (43:19):

Down? Finally,

Anne Kelly  (43:20):

They haven’t had shows there in a really long time.

Speaker 3 (43:24):

It’s just falling apart.

Anne Kelly  (43:25):

Uh, yeah, but at one point they were actively gonna tear it down. I mean, I know they tore down a lot of buildings. They were tearing down trees.

Criox Williamson (43:33):

I saw cage match there, cage a cage fight <laugh> oh,

Anne Kelly  (43:37):

Wow. I

Speaker 3 (43:38):

Just that’s. Yeah. I saw my first concert at Apollo. You guys, Tiffany, I think we were alone. Now. You said

Anne Kelly  (43:50):

The first under five cassette tapes I owned was, was a cassette.

Criox Williamson (43:56):

Me too. You too. <laugh> no, I’m just kidding. <laugh>

Anne Kelly  (44:02):

Of, of all of the live show there, one that stands out or, or a favorite, was it the Tiffany show Talia <laugh> no,

Speaker 3 (44:12):

Uh, I would say biggie smalls. Ooh. I saw, yeah. With naughty by nature and a bunch of other, uh, acts at, um, in Albuquerque when I was, I was 17. That was pretty cool. Yeah.

Anne Kelly  (44:31):

Tell us of that show.

Criox Williamson (44:34):

Yeah,

Anne Kelly  (44:34):

For sure. What about you cry?

Criox Williamson (44:37):

My, my favorite show of all time was ministry at the, uh, Las Rosa in Austin, Texas. Nice and made Austin. And they had the chain league fence in front of, and it was crazy crazy show,

Anne Kelly  (44:55):

I guess say of all of the things I’m kind of missing. I think live music missed that almost more than anything.

Criox Williamson (45:02):

Actually, I was supposed to see ministry this summer

Anne Kelly  (45:05):

In the rail yard park every Saturday night during the summer, we would have different free and those were really amazing. So I’m really hoping to get those back next summer for sure.

Criox Williamson (45:19):

Yeah. I saw the Reverend Horton heat over there from Houston. So they play in Austin a lot. So

Anne Kelly  (45:24):

The opportunity to see a lot of amazing live music, but the, the show that stands out for me and this is a whole hilarious story. I don’t know. I was probably like 12 to 14 or so, and I was a huge Aerosmith fan and I wanted to go see this show and, but my dad wasn’t really comfortable letting me go on my own. So he went with us and so it was one of my best friends at the time, Molly and my brother and I, and we were at Fiddler’s green in Denver. And so it was kind of, it was an outdoor amphitheater and it had the seat, you know, the normal seats, but then the green behind it. Um, and so we were on our blanket and we were hanging out and all of a sudden this guy comes up and asks, I, I don’t know, he just starts talking to us and he thought it was so cool that my dad had brought us to the show that he offers us front row <laugh>. So we got to see Aerosmith front row, front center seats, even Tyler’s hand when he was singing dream on, oh my God, I still love Aerosmith. But I was really obsessed with Aerosmith for a long time. After that I had, I think, 20 cassette Aerosmith, cassette tapes at one time.

Criox Williamson (46:51):

That’s funny. I, I lived with this girl that she was obsessed with Aerosmith and she would turn Aerosmith up so loud and just jam. And I never heard, I mean, I never listened to Aerosmith or had any other albums. So there was all these songs I never, ever heard. And it didn’t sound like Aerosmith to me. I was like, what is, that’s not Aerosmith? What is it? Cause they have a lot of stuff that wasn’t big hits. So it’s kind of funny. And she would just jam out, dude. She loved Aerosmith. Sounds like you and her will probably hang out. I’ve gotten to meet a lot of, a lot of artists in Austin. I met a band that I like, which actually their lead singer died, but I got to meet him, was power trip, which is a thrash metal band outta Dallas, Texas. And I got to meet those guys once I also got to meet, uh, Tommy, Victor from prong, which is, is another one of my favorite bands. I like that industrial metal stuff. I always always into that stuff. So that was cool. I got to shake his hand cuz cuz my friend, this girl, a friend of mine, she was really good friends. Grew up with that, their bla bass player at the time. So I got to meet him, him and you know yeah, I was, that was pretty cool.

Anne Kelly  (48:12):

I think it’s just amazing being able to, to meet the artists that you admire.

Criox Williamson (48:17):

Yeah, yeah for sure. Actually I met rode horn heat too. Those guys, uh, and I, when I was a kid, I was smoking a joint in the line <laugh> and I was like, Hey man, they were walking by. I was like, Hey man, you want to hit? And they were like, no thanks. <laugh> and I was like, that’s off. You don’t wanna smoke weed. You know what I mean? That’s what I thought to myself. But of course now I look back, I’m like, of course you didn’t want to take a, hit off some high school kids joint on the side of the road. That’s terrible idea.

Anne Kelly  (48:51):

So, so I was talking about collecting tapes pro is there anything else that, that you collect?

Criox Williamson (48:59):

Oh, I collect all sorts of junk to make art out of. I also collect, um, well, you know, I collect a lot of minerals, but I don’t have them out. They’re put away because, um, that’s cool though, but I love minerals, really incredible looking minerals. I love that stuff. So I have tons of these crazy crystals and, and uh, geological oddities, you know and slices cuz and also, oh yeah. And I got these, these cool things. Well this is not from Africa. I made this one, but this, these are all from Africa. Cool. Weird objects. So cool. Look at that. Like what is that? All these weird things, you know, like how cool is that? You look at this one. This is really cool. So, and I guess these were like some kind of things that you put on a altar, like as a like, um, sacrifice or I don’t know about a sacrifice, like, like a toner. Yeah. Just yeah, yeah. Whatever you call it. Yeah. I’m not so, uh, that’s what the guy told me. I mean, who knows, but you, I just thought they were so cool. So I bought all these and I was gonna make necklaces out of ’em or something, you know, bracelets, but I haven’t gotten around to it still, man. I got some weird things, but yeah, I kind of just have it to play with.

Anne Kelly  (50:30):

I thought it was interesting. I didn’t know about the, the minerals and, and crystals. You mentioned cuz you, you do say in your artist statement that that is kind of an inspiration for, for the art that you make is the patterns that occur in nature naturally and how you’re kind of playing that.

Criox Williamson (50:52):

Oh yeah, for sure. I love like really aged and gnarly looking things like really old looking steel pieces that are, I love the pitted, you know, rawness of it or, you know, there’s some that I’m gonna work on soon that, uh, uh, where I, well actually I actually have a lot of, um, steel. That’s all really old and beaten up, up in Colorado that I have to pick up. And um, it’s a bunch of scrap metal, but it’s really old been worn down, you know, over the years and it’s heavy plate and I’m gonna make sculptures out of that and little one, you know, pieces oddies and stuff. Um, yeah, but I love that. I love the way I love rocks and stones. And I mean, I, one of my favorite things to do is to walk down river beds and look at the cool stones, the river stones. And, and in fact I got some incredible river stones that I got from my mom’s place. Here’s one, these are my lifting stones. See, look at that’s cool. So that’s one that’s yeah. So look, you can see how big it is, but it’s, it’s, it’s a perfectly smooth river rock and is kind of a rough one. This is my friends. He brought it over and that’s much heavier. I love

Anne Kelly  (52:13):

That you both are lifting your stones together. That is

Criox Williamson (52:16):

<laugh> he hasn’t come over here yet. He just brought it over, but supposedly we’re gonna do it supposedly <laugh> yeah, yeah, yeah.

Anne Kelly  (52:25):

Rock over. I’ll over my Ketle bells. Yeah.

Criox Williamson (52:29):

Yeah. <laugh> well, I wanna get a bigger kettle. I like KET balls. He like

Anne Kelly  (52:34):

Weld handles onto the rocks.

Criox Williamson (52:38):

Yeah. Well I’ve thought about that. Actually. The only thing is rocks are not as heavy as metal. Steel is so much denser, so, um, it’d have to be a big, you know, uh, I’ve thought about that. Cause to make a kind of Flinstone kettlebells bolt a big handle into the kettlebell, it would be cool. I could do it and I probably will eventually just to make it happen. Well,

Anne Kelly  (53:02):

My former kettlebell instructor has a YouTube channel now as well. So maybe we can collaborate with her.

Criox Williamson (53:11):

Well, you know, what’s funny. I did a commercial for, um, for the iron man, kettle bell. I did a commercial in my old shop, had my forge going and was messing with this thing in the fire and then put the torch on it and weld. So I took an old kettlebell that they had already and I welded, you know, on it so it could get the, so it could look like I was making the kettlebell and stuff and that’s actually this kettlebell, right, right here. I’ll show you, oh, on it. That the brand on it, you ever heard of that they do. They make kettlebells and workout things, but I’ll show you, I’m gonna switch this, but yeah, you can look it up on YouTube. It’s on there for on it. It’s the commercial for the Ironman. Ketlebell see. And I welded it right there and they gave it kettle to me. See, so I grinded the weld, I grinded the weld off. So it looked pretty sort of,

Anne Kelly  (54:09):

And this comes up, you know, when, when you’re creative, you can’t help but be creative and it’s not just gonna ex you know, stop at making, painting. It extends into kettlebells and lifting rocks.

Criox Williamson (54:22):

Sure. Those are the kind of things we do so we can keep going. You know, mm-hmm <affirmative> yeah. I mean, I, that’s why I do it, cuz I want to be able, I don’t want, cause I have plenty of friends that have taken their backs out, you know, lifting stuff and, and they got permanent or injury, you know, and I don’t wanna do that. I wanna be able to work for till I’m 150.

Anne Kelly  (54:46):

No, we gotta take care of ourselves mentally and, and physically and whatever that means. Yes. That’s for sure. I’m super into it. Well, it was so much fun talking to you guys and, and introducing you guys, maybe you met briefly in the real world and I definitely went to see golden general, but I don’t think I got the opportunity to introduce you guys. So it was really fun to be able to do that tonight. And hopefully we can do that in the real world sooner than later. Yes

Criox Williamson (55:19):

We will. We could do it outside in the sun. Yeah. Yeah.

Anne Kelly  (55:25):

But before Roy, I’m creating a list of favorite movies by creative people and it could be like your favorite movie ever. Uh, favorite recent movie, favorite movie when you were a kid?

Criox Williamson (55:40):

Well, one of my favorite movies I just watched recently was Brazil.

Anne Kelly  (55:44):

I don’t know if I’ve seen that.

Criox Williamson (55:46):

So Terry Gilia, a movie it’s amazing.

Anne Kelly  (55:49):

Oh, okay,

Criox Williamson (55:50):

Cool. Yeah. Yeah. Time Bandit’s Brazil. And he does a, yeah. I like love those movies time. Bandit is another one of my favorite movies ever. And then, and actually if you watch Brazil, you will see why I like, uh, eclectic, crazy stuff. That is the why list. I mean, the sets are so incredible in that movie and you’re just like, yeah, yeah, it’s great. It’s great. Terry Gillum is probably one of my favorite artists ever probably

Anne Kelly  (56:21):

See it’s all connected

Criox Williamson (56:23):

Colored lights, good music, you know, wild art of all kinds, you know, <laugh> yes. And lifting rock lifting rocks definitely helps strengthen myself so that I can move some of my art around too. Cause some of it gets pretty heavy.

Anne Kelly  (56:40):

Well, thank you. Both of you so much for joining tonight there of you have any, any shoutouts

Criox Williamson (56:46):

To anybody, uh, to, to Ryan, Scott and Aarons over there at Meadowbrook Austin and uh, Kim Hargrove over here in Santa Fe. Uh, I don’t know, uh, William Coburn, what

Anne Kelly  (56:58):

Up, the part of my motivation for the show is keeping people creep and connected. So thank you so much for anybody who’s listening. And if you enjoyed the conversation, keep it going, like comment, subscribe, let us know what other conversations or content you might wanna see. And overall we really appreciate you. It’s a brand, a new show. So thank you guys for being on the show. Thank you for everybody for listening. Just, just really appreciate it. Awesome.

Criox Williamson (57:33):

Thanks Anne. Thank you, Anne. Thank you so

Anne Kelly  (57:35):

Much. Thank you guys. We’ll talk soon.

Criox Williamson (57:40):

All right. Over and out.

Speaker 4 (57:55):

I.