Artist Profiles | Joel Pelletier

Joel Pelletier is an American musician and painter based in Los Angeles.

American Fundamentalists

In 1990 artist Joel Pelletier first saw James Ensor's classic 1888 Belgian pre-expressionist masterpiece "Christ's Entry into Brussels in 1889" hanging at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles. This painting depicted a giant parade down the streets of Brussels in honour of the return of Jesus, barely visible in the middle of the crowd, while in the foreground Belgian's elite congratulate themselves and celebrated the fact that Jesus' chose Brussels for his second coming, rather than the second coming itself. Ensor so insulted the Belgian art and business community with his commentary and satire that the painting was never shown in public in Belgium during his lifetime.

Pelletier saw immediate parallels to today's American political and business culture, especially in it's use of religion and religious terminology to gain and hold power. After the selection of George W. Bush in 2000, more and more walls between church and state have been destroyed, along with further consolidation of corporate and media power. Joel realised that Ensor's fable could easily be transported to Washington DC in the near future, with some of the same (and many new) conclusions to be drawn from the spectacle.

www.americanfundamentalists.com