Everyone thinks of art as a solitary pursuit. It is a solitary activity, but whole hoards pursue it. Art people, in particular, build communities around themselves and one another, in order to facilitate not just the production of artwork, but the growth, sustenance, and stability of those who do the producing. Cranky as they are, artists are among the most social of animals. Bill Radawec was a brilliant artist, to be sure, witty, insightful and inventive; but he impressed me most as a communitarian, dedicated to the well-being of his fellow artists (and those who love 'em) and so fully identified with the "art scene" that he would sacrifice his own productivity to get his friends' - and acquaintances', and strangers', and (if he had any) enemies' - art out in the public. He clearly regarded the display and dissemination of others' art part of his own portfolio.
That's how I knew Bill during his years in Los Angeles, and that's how I heard from and about him during his Akron years - or Ohio years, I should call them, as his presence seemed to stretch from Toledo to Youngstown. Bill may or may not have been larger than life, but he was larger than art - because he was dedicated to helping others get theirs out as well as making his own. "Art is what makes life more interesting than art," Robert Filliou wrote, and Bill demonstrated that living art was the most interesting thing of all.
It takes a village to raise a child - and produce art. Bill Radawec could have run for mayor of that village. And won.
Peter Frank
Senior Curator at the Riverside Art Museum and art crtic for Angeleno Magazine
Regarding Bill Radawec…
my mind goes into overdrive, a natural reaction to the almost frenetic energy Bill possessed. How in the world did he manage to cultivate such a devoted cast-ofthousands and communicate with all of them while being a prolific artist with a strong, challenging body of work? Not to mention surfing the web. And, of course, the ongoing love and inspiration with his soul mate Ibjoka. Perhaps he never slept or was bionic or had a super-powered chip for a brain…
Running through my mind is that tune from The Sound of Music “How do you solve a problem like Will I Am (Maria for those of you who haven’t memorized every word of the musical)?” with a nod to the supercool member of the Black Eyed Peas. How is it possible to understand the multi-faceted, fantastical creature that is Mr. Bill? I called him the man behind the curtain aka The Wizard of Oz. Well, he is the wizard, a merry
prankster, and an everyman, all at the same time.
Bill and I connected on a deep level instantly—- that was Bill: intense, hysterically funny, a raconteur par excellence who always made you feel that you were the center of the universe. We lived parallel lives for years before becoming friends as our paths crossed in Los Angeles without our ever knowing it. We knew the same people. We saw the same exhibitions. We shared similar experiences of living in the miraculous
kaleidoscope of that vibrant city that could barely contain the awesome beauty of the beach and the heroic folk art of Watts Towers, the kitsch on many street corners and the treasures of MOCA, the Taper, the Museum of Jurassic Technology. (In fact, David Wilson could do a fantastic job by adding Bill Radawec to his cast of characters.) LA inspired us, inculcating an insatiable curiosity about the world.
Add to that shared experience a love of ideas, a Rube Goldberg/FischliWeiss wonder of how things actually worked, and those six degrees of separation, which in Bill’s case were reduced to only two or three. And don’t forget the sensibility we picked up from the sixties’ counterculture.
Bill could spin a tale of Sammy Davis Jr, complete with show-and-tell artifacts, connect the dots between Frank Lloyd Wright and Lincoln Logs, reduce the convoluted complexities of 9/11 to the simplicity of a white wisp in a blue sky with his contrails, generate haikus in his color chip paintings, and create miniature dioramas for the miniscule HO figures, personalizing his subject in each and every work. His interests
ranged from the quotidian to the inexplicable, with numerous stops in between. And he was on the verge of a new endeavor, the collaborative efforts with his wife. Everything was fodder for his art, his way of sharing a boy’s wonder at the world in which he lived.
So how can we memorialize the inimitable Mr. Bill? One of Yoshitomo Nara’s numerous characters could capture the inquisitive, mischievous little boy with an effervescent charm, insatiable wit, and overwhelming energy. Mr. Bill from SNL? Or… Did you know that you can design your very own bobble head? Yes, that’s it: a talking Mr. Bill bobble head.
Vicky Clark
Assistant Professor, Art History and Gallery Director at Clarion University, Pittsburgh