Photo: Joe Roberts. Home Sweet Home, 2009
The Hero’s Journey is one of our most beloved narratives, an adventure undertaken by the rare individual willing to risk it all in order to win. The concept was introduced by Joseph Campbell in The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1949) who, “ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man.”
Roberts has been creating a series of vibrant mixed-media works exploring the Hero’s Journey from a distinctive vantage point. Born in Madison, Wisconsin, in 1976, comic books made up the bulk of Roberts’ childhood reading material. He went on to attend the San Francisco Art Institute, where he claims to have mainly learned about drugs.
The combination of the two is a cocktail of charm and wit spiked with a shot of devilish delight, resulting in LSD Worldpeace (Unpiano Books), presenting of the last decade of Roberts’ work. Through the use of crayons, paper, and found objects, Roberts creates cartoon scenes of a captivating world filled with magic and possibility. The familiar becomes infused with mystical energies, and invites us along for the ride.
Joe Roberts. Still Life 1, 2010
In her essay, Myla Dalbesio provides deeply felt insight into the Roberts’ family life, exploring the relationship between death, art, and rebirth. She writes, “It was our grandfather who taught us to make art….Time spent with Grandpa was a lesson in creativity and introspection…. Among a handful of grandchildren, Joe was the only boy. A gold child, carrying Grandpa’s middle name and his carefully hidden favoritism. It was Joe that got to hop into the dumpsters, Joe that received secret instructions in shoplifting. And it is in Joe’s work that we can best see this influence of family, and this deeply veined exploration of the afterlife, the sublime. Childhood caricatures mingle with one another in cavernous hallways and catacombs, float weightlessly in starry skies.”
Joe Roberts. The Edge of Magic, 2012
Roberts’ work whisks us away, so that time ceases to exist, and all we want to do is look with wonder and an open heart, the same way one does on an LSD trip. Roberts provides a cast of characters, along with list of medicines, books, weapons/tools, and symbols inherent to his work, and here it is that the mind explodes with a joyous pleasure that is truly beyond words. Here is a place where the Grateful Dead, Batman, and the Wu Tang Clan mix and mingle, a world where our Hero’s Journey includes Kool-Aid, Butterfinger bars, and Cheetos cure the ills while Rubik’s Cubes, Air Jordans, and Uzis are tools of choice. Somply put, LSD Worldpeace is some of the best fun you will ever have in paperback.
LSD Worldpeace is published by Unpiano Books.
Miss Rosen is a New York-based writer, curator, and brand strategist. There is nothing she adores so much as photography and books. A small part of her wishes she had a proper library, like in the game of Clue. Then she could blaze and write soliloquies to her in and out of print loves.
