The J. Francis/Kubrick Correspondences - 03.12.1957

J. Francis to Kubrick

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March 12, 1957

Stanley,

Paths of Glory is the most honest film I’ve ever seen about command. You didn't just show war—you unmasked it. It reminded me of something I scribbled years ago: “floating is just sinking in denial.”

What you’ve made is more than cinema. It’s an x-ray of military myth.

—J. Francis

What If the Kennedys Went Punk?

CONCEPT STATEMENT FOR VINYL V

I’ve been mulling over ideas for the next vinyl show and even bought my record—but last night, it all clicked at once. Eureka—I know exactly how to proceed.

For the upcoming Vinyl V: Cut Corner show at ABA Gallery, I’m diving headfirst into a new black and white oil painting on vinyl (no time for color)—an original copy of the Dead Kennedys’ Bedtime for Democracy (1986). But this isn’t just about putting paint on a record again. I want to do a bit more, beyond the Iggy Pop 'The Idiot' vinyl I did in 2021, where I complimented the artwork with a dangling microphone and Fender amp below the piece. This is going to be a full-fledged alternate history experiment.

In this imagined timeline, John F. Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy never enter politics due to their fathers financial collapse in the 1930's. Instead, they never reach the political podium, and instead follow other pursuits only to later find their voices in the raw, defiant pulse of the 1970s London and New York punk scenes. Together, they start a zine called Rebel Sons—a manifesto of rebellion, commentary, and blistering social critique. They become fixtures of the movement, influencing its aesthetic and anarchic philosophy.

Beyond the painting itself, I want to bring this alternate history to life by creating real copies of Rebel Sons zine, started in 1977 (black and white) for the gallery—available alongside the vinyl. I'll start with issue #4. 

I’m going to need to build a narrative timeline that tracks the brothers’ rise as punk provocateurs. I plan on crafting a fictional interview with some period scene writer, and even writing some articles by JFK himself for their zine under the pseudonym J. Francis—think "JFK on Anarchy vs. Order".

This isn’t just a record with a double portrait of the brothers—it’ll be a relic from a universe that never was, a set of documents of a parallel rebellion. I’m excited to push this concept beyond the canvas (vinyl), to let the punk-era Kennedys walk among us, fists in the air... shouting.

Heavy Possessions

MAILING TRANSFERRAL

March 29, 2025
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BARKER - Hollywood Schaefer Collage (4x9 postcard)

A Treatise on Fine Art vs. Commercial Art: The Artist’s Responsibility to Themselves

Art, by its very nature, is an intimate act of creation—an extension of the artist’s perspective, experiences, and inner dialogue. It is not a service rendered but a statement made. As such, I do not believe it is the responsibility of the artist to simplify or adapt their work to fit within the framework of the viewer’s familiarity or comprehension. The burden of interpretation lies with the audience, not the creator.

When I create fine art—the work I do for myself—it is born from personal exploration, symbolism, and often, a nuanced language of references that may be obscure or layered. Some viewers may find my works and even artist statements daunting or esoteric, while others may find them familiar and resonant. This disparity is inevitable and, more importantly, acceptable. Art is not meant to hold the hand of its audience; it is meant to exist on its own terms, regardless of whether it is immediately understood or even understood at all.

To clarify my perspective: not every viewer approaches a work with the same knowledge base. Some may recognize the symbolic weight of a specific material, while others may only see its surface. This variance in interpretation is natural and, in many ways, the lifeblood of art itself. The viewer brings their own narrative, biases, and insights, meeting the work where they are—whether at a glance or in deep contemplation.

However, when an artist alters their work to cater to the broader expectations of accessibility or clarity, they cross the threshold from fine art into commercial art. Commercial art serves the masses. It seeks to be understood, to resonate with the largest possible audience, and to offer immediate familiarity. This is not a lesser pursuit—it is simply a different one, often bound by external objectives. But in my own practice, I reject the notion of tailoring my creative output to meet the interpretive ease of others.

My fine art carries its own language—sometimes cryptic, sometimes accessible—but always honest. I offer my thoughts and process through my statements and works, but I feel no obligation to dilute them for the sake of universal comprehension. The artist's role is not to render meaning palatable; it is to express it authentically. If the viewer cannot or does not wish to decipher it, that is their choice. And if they do, they have engaged in the very dialogue that makes art enduring.

Thus, I remain committed to creating work on my own terms. Whether met with understanding or bewilderment, it will remain a reflection of my vision—uncompromised by expectation.

Thomas Arthur Schaefer — 2025

Six Premonitions of the Faminine Facade

ARTISTS STATEMENT

Six Premonitions of the Feminine Facade is a deeply personal exploration of entrapment, fragility, and the eventual reclamation of self through ritual and preservation. The work serves as both a reliquary and a warning—a visual spell that captures the echoes of a fractured relationship and the transformative alchemy of will.
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At its core, a real spider web, fragile yet hauntingly intact, is suspended on black paper beneath glass. This delicate snare, simultaneously ethereal and confining, becomes a spectral symbol of emotional imprisonment. Much like the web, the artist found himself ensnared—estranged from friends, family, and his own creative passions—slowly becoming a vessel for another’s desires. The glass, a barrier both protective and impenetrable, speaks to the tension between vulnerability and self-preservation, while also transforming the once-trapping web into an artifact of control, framed and contained.
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To the right of this spectral centerpiece, a brittle composition of rotting wood, twigs, an abandoned hornet’s nest, a dried white rose, and a scattering of cicada shells clings to a rusted metal post—a relic salvaged from a former shared home. The decaying materials evoke the fragile remnants of a disintegrating bond, while the cicada shells (exuviae) symbolize the hollow residue of transformation. Their absence of life alludes to both the shedding of an old self and the lingering imprint of what was once vital. The white rose, once a symbol of unity and devotion worn as the artist’s wedding boutonniere, now preserved among these remains, transforms into an artifact of dissolution—its withered petals a memento of vows undone. This assemblage of natural decay is juxtaposed against a Con Edison construction barrier—an industrial warning sign. The stark orange and white panel cautions the viewer, symbolizing the overlooked omens of fracture and the necessary vigilance to heed them.
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Beneath the spider web, six glass reagent bottles rest in compartments housed within a custom multi-faceted black box frame—ritually burned before assembly. Each bottle contains an element associated with ceremonial magic: salt, frankincense, myrrh, copal, styrax, and Aleister Crowley’s Tetragrammaton Incense, composed of galbanum, onycha, storax, and olibanum—each representing an elemental force. The salt, recalling Crowley’s Gnostic Mass, speaks to spiritual purification: “Let the salt of Earth admonish the water to bear the virtue of the Great Sea.” It is a reminder of the alchemical power to sanctify and transform, while the incenses evoke both invocation and exorcism—a symbolic act of burning away remnants of the past while simultaneously reclaiming power through ritual.
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Ultimately, Six Premonitions of the Feminine Facade is a testament to both suffering and sovereignty. It bears witness to the slow unraveling of self within a relationship, yet also to the fire-forged resilience that emerges from it. The work captures and preserves the haunting fragility of loss but also enshrines the willful transmutation of pain into wisdom. The viewer is left with a cautionary relic—a sanctified scar—both a warning and an invocation of personal reclamation.

I’ve Tried My Best To Give You A Good Life

ARTISTS STATEMENT

At first glance, I’ve Tried My Best To Give You A Good Life appears deceptively simple—a sparse arrangement of vintage Fla-Vor-Aid packets and meticulously recreated M&B Laboratory Chemicals potassium cyanide bottles. Yet, for those who recognize the history, the banality of these objects becomes suffocating. The grape-flavored drink, once a symbol of childhood sweetness, and the pharmaceutical vessels, once instruments of healing, are transformed into haunting relics of mass death. Together, they embody the grotesque synthesis of commercial innocence and pharmaceutical finality—the very tools Jim Jones used to execute his apocalyptic vision.

The sculpture speaks to the sinister mechanism of cult manipulation—religious guilt sharpened into a weapon of absolute control. The three cyanide bottles, representing the Christian Trinity, reference Jones' perverse corruption of spiritual doctrine. His promise of salvation became a grim parody, where faith was reduced to obedience and self-sacrifice became the only path to grace. The title itself, I’ve Tried My Best To Give You A Good Life, echoes with tragic irony—perhaps Jones’ own warped justification for the mass murder-suicide. The words feel almost parental, soothing and remorseful, as if spoken to a child moments before administering the poison.

The piece also reflects on the cruel entrapment of the Jonestown community—devoted individuals who, through cycles of fear, manipulation, and rehearsed death drills, became prisoners of their own faith. The “White Night” drills, where Jones coerced his followers into staging practice suicides, blurred the line between performance and reality. When the final night came, the community, already psychologically broken, had no escape from their orchestrated doom.

In this work, I explore the devastating interplay between ideological devotion and pharmaceutical complicity. The chemical industry—through the cold banality of the cyanide bottles—becomes an unwitting accomplice to religious extremism. The grape-flavored packets, an all-too-familiar symbol of consumer culture, serve as a haunting reminder that mass tragedy can be wrapped in the packaging of something familiar, even sweet.

Ultimately, I’ve Tried My Best To Give You A Good Life reflects my ongoing fascination with the fragility of free will under charismatic domination. It is a reflection on the horrors individuals can inflict upon a willing population through the slow erosion of personal agency. It asks how one man’s paranoia, fed by religious dogma and mirrored in militaristic drills, could reduce hundreds of lives to nothing more than empty packets and discarded bottles.

The Archway Ofrendas

ARTISTS STATEMENT

The Archway Ofrendas is a series of five mixed-media panels serving as reliquaries dedicated to the five owners of the brewery where the works were displayed. Each piece blends collage and painting, with a central portrait of an owner backed by radiant gold leaf, reminiscent of religious iconography. The portraits are framed within an archway, where a pentagram—an ancient symbol of unity and hidden knowledge—serves as the focal point, evoking the esoteric nature of brewing itself, where elemental forces transform humble grains into something transcendent.

The collage elements, composed of tabloid paper and reconstructed black-and-white prints of massive fermentation vessels and mash machines, offer a subtle nod to the industrial alchemy of the brewing process. The panels are further imbued with elemental associations: air (yellow), fire (red), water (blue), earth (green), and spirit (white), each represented through color and symbolic materiality.

Before each panel stood a small ofrenda—an offering of reverence—featuring a wooden cube, a glass reagent bottle filled with colored grain, and a hexagram star candle holder, all color-coded to match the corresponding element. During the exhibition, the candles were lit daily, and patrons were encouraged to leave offerings, transforming the space into a participatory ritual of honor and devotion.

In Archway Ofrendas, the tradition of the ofrenda—a sacred offering typically reserved for Día de los Muertos altars—was reimagined as a living tribute. Here, the reverence was directed not toward the departed, but toward the living figures who shaped the brewery’s spirit. Through its fusion of religious symbolism, alchemical references, and ritualistic participation, the series blurred the line between art and sacred space, transforming the brewery into a temple of craft and tribute.

Into The Lost

When it comes to describing artworks that I no longer have any reference material, communication, or documentation of—whether photographic or otherwise—the right phrasing is key. The challenge lies in selecting a term that accurately conveys the nature of their absence. Are these pieces merely obscured and adrift, or are they truly lost, erased by time itself?

To determine which term best captures this state, let’s break down the subtle but significant difference between "Lost in Time" and "Lost to Time".

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"Lost in Time"

• Suggests being trapped, suspended, or adrift in a timeless state
• Implies ambiguity—the object or artist is somewhere in time but obscured, not necessarily erased
• Often used for mysterious, mythical, or forgotten things that could theoretically be rediscovered

"Lost to Time"

• Implies permanence—something that is irretrievably gone or erased by the passage of time
• More final and absolute
• Carries a sense of historical loss or oblivion

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After weighing the nuances of each phrase, I believe "Lost to Time" is the more fitting term moving forward. It conveys a sense of permanence and historical finality, accurately reflecting the works that have vanished without trace—those that are not simply obscured but truly beyond recovery.

This is the terminology I will use going forward for works I lack any reference material on, besides my own memory.