An oil-soaked American flag hangs in the Miller Fine Arts Center, serving as a social critique created by junior Gabriel Stallings, a ceramic sculpture major.
The 6-foot-long flag is draped into a red bucket of motor oil. More pools of oil sit around the base of the brimming bucket.
Stallings said that he created the piece as a personal project to reflect the fact that the United States is responsible for 25 percent of the world’s oil consumption.
“I wanted to illustrate and confront the fact that we’re trading American values for oil,” Stallings said. “It’s sad and ridiculous that we place more priority on driving our cars than soldiers’ lives.”
Stallings said that the flag is related to many of his other pieces, which offer commentaries by reflecting society.
“My art is a social mirror,” he said. “I want it to make people think by putting them in an awkward or strange place and asking them to deal with it. Even if they can’t come up with a resolution, at least they’ll be aware.”
Stallings said his piece received a variety of comments.
“I heard someone say, ‘It’s so 2001,’ which I find ironic,” Stallings said. “We’re still at war, even though we don’t look like we are. We don’t really see the costs — they are just shown to us on spreadsheets.”
Brandon Owings, who works in the Linfield College utilities specialist services, said that after growing up in a military family and serving for nine months in the army, he felt disappointed with the oil-soaked flag.
“I went into the service at age 18 and basically signed my life over as a blank check,” Owings said. “Servicemen wear the flag on their uniforms while defending this country, so I was hurt to see that someone would treat it that way.”
Senior Joelle Cheek said that while she didn’t have a strong opinion about the piece, she understood the mixed critiques.
“If someone has an idea of what the American flag stands for and then sees it treated differently than that, I can see how it would be upsetting,” Cheek said. “But on the other hand, freedom of speech is still valuable for someone else who hasn’t had that background with the flag.”
Joanna Peterson
Culture reporter Joanna Perterson can be reached at [email protected]