COME AND TAKE IT

William Kent, Amer., (1919-2012), COME AND TAKE IT, Color Slate Print, 1964, printed 2008, Ed. of  at least 6, 25-5/8 x 22-3/8, full uneven hand cut margins, signed, dated and annotated "mono-print" in black ball point pen, a few tiny spots of foxing and slight toning to image and margins, on white cotton fabric measuring 33-3/8 x 35, The title is from the third early Texas Flag Kent used. The French gave the Texans a canon that had a larger caliber than the Mexicans allowed, and when they demanded it be turned over to them the Texans said "Come and Take it" During the Vietnam War, General Curtis LeMay of the U.S. Air force, second from left,  threatened to knock the Vietnamese back to the Stone Age. Kent's defiant image of politicians standing their ground before the American flag once again provides a provocative and eerily relevant symbol for the recent events in our nation's capital.