Make Art, Not War: Carl McCrow Transforms Guns into Provocative Statements on Violence

To create the pieces featured in “History Interrupted, The Art of Disarmament,” McCrow started with decommissioned weaponry—obtained directly from areas of conflict—and used stencils, lacquer, paint, gold plating, and chemical stains to suffuse each object with additional layers of meaning. Painted red and emblazoned with the cheerful logos of Mattel and Fisher-Price, Toy Gun, for instance, makes sharp reference to the plight of the child soldier. The gilded Portrait of a Magazine, in turn, centers around an AK47 procured from the first Gulf War. Plated in 24k gold and lavishly framed, it’s a provocative juxtaposition of firearms and wealth, especially given its origins.

Every gun tells a story, McCrow’s collection seems to say—and the artist, who’s on a personal mission to deactivate and destroy as many weapons as possible, considers it his duty to share them. Like many young men, McCrow was vaguely intrigued by guns and violent video games from an early age; he later incorporated them into his art. But his relationship to weaponry changed in 2009 when a close friend lost both legs and an arm in an explosion while serving with the British Army in Afghanistan. “Matt’s injuries were horrific,” McCrow later said. “It made me sick to my stomach and I couldn’t actually do my work, it just didn’t feel the same. I thought, I’m not worthy to make artwork out of this while lives are being smashed on the other side of it.”