Rick Green

Welcome to the Intersection of Faith and Culture. It's the WallBuilder Show. We're taking on hot topics of the day from a biblical, historical and constitutional perspective. I'm Rick Green, America’s Constitution Coach, here with Tim Barton he's the National Speaker and Pastor and President of Wall Builders and David Barton, America’s Premier Historian and our founder here at WallBuilders. And guys, today's a little bit different. You know we're always talking education, politics, all kinds of different things. We don't talk art that much and you know, maybe we should, because it is such a big part of what a culture, how a culture learns, and it tells you a lot about a culture, and so I think this is going to be pretty interesting today tells you a lot about a culture, and so I think this is going to be pretty interesting today.

Tim Barton

Well, I think maybe one of the reasons we haven't talked a lot about it is usually art as an industry very left, generally very woke, and unless we're talking about some good action movie which falls under art, or some good musician which falls under art, very good point.

You know not a lot of other things we would go to, although my wife is absolutely an incredible artist, very talented, and she'll want to play these art games sometimes and I'm just terrible at them. I don't enjoy things that I am not gifted and inclined to do as much, but she loves it. However, I have taken her many times and she might not agree many times, I think like three or four times over the many years we've been married. That's a bunch of times we've gone to like art museums.

The wife says well, once in a while rarely he takes me to an art museum. The husband says, man, we go to these art museums all the time.

Rick Green

All the time.

Tim Barton

You've correctly assessed the situation, correctly assess the situation, but it it is mind-boggling to me some of the things that are on display with this modern art perspective that you're going to take like 12 sponges and stack them and glue them to each other and and somebody made tens of thousands of dollars on this quote art project.

It's one of the dumbest things ever, but it is one of the things that you see, with a breakdown of some culture, of some values and norms, when they're redefining what beauty is, they're changing that narrative, and so it's one of the reasons we haven't spent a lot of time there. However, as we've talked about the, the fact that Christians ought to be a part of, of all kinds of the areas of culture, wherever God has called and gifted you, use the giftings God's given you to be salt and light in that arena. If it's media, if it's the arts, entertainment, whatever it is, take that gift God's given you and use it to be salt and light to make a difference, and so it's something we've encouraged people to do and, again, we've seen very talented people. We have been very blessed over the years to meet some talented artists. We've actually had some do some different portrait work of different founding fathers some very cool stuff. But generally speaking we have seen the art field and the art industry go a very secular, progressive, anti-god, anti-america direction in ideology as a whole.

David Barton

I recently saw a sculpture that was being done for the World War I Memorial and that will open literally in a matter of days. But as I looked at the sculpture and it was dozens of feet long and really tall, more than life-size it actually was a sculpture that told a story and the faces looked like faces of real people. They didn't look like caricatures or where a lot of modern art goes. You have to interpret it. Somebody has to tell you what you're looking at. This was something that really told a story and that's always resonated with me is the old art work that you see, the old classical, biblical art, the adventure, anything else. It tells a story and it was there to help tell history.

And I was really intrigued with the World War I Memorial because, number one I didn't know they were building one in DC and that was about to open and number two, the book that we've been working on right now WallBuilders deals with World War I and World War II, and so what I have seen in World War I is I didn't know that much about it. It's called the Great War, it's also called the Forgotten War and it has been forgotten. And as I got into researching it and found the stories of so many really cool people in it. And you know, rick, I'm just going to take you vicarious, I'll pick on you. Tim knows the answer to this question. I've been talking to him.

Rick Green

Tell me who Eugene Bullard is. Mr Bullard, that's who that is. That's Mr Bullard.

David Barton

I have just described to you the first black combat pilot in American history. He was in World War I. Oh wow, I will tell you that I had known the name Eddie Rickenbacker. Do you know anything about Eddie Rickenbacker? I don't. No, he was the greatest ace in World War I, but he was also in World War II. He also owned the NE500 Speedway. He raced cars.

He ran Eastern Airlines. The guy's phenomenal, but he was an American hero in World War I because of what he did with aviation and combat. But then he got shot down in World War II. The president had sent him on a mission to go look at all the air bases in the Pacific. Now that we're in World War II, tell me what we need to do, tell me what we need to fix. And on the way there his plane got off course. He wasn't flying it, but the pilot got off course and they crash landed in the Pacific Ocean. No one knew they went down or where they were. There were eight guys in the plane.

They got in two rafts and they spent the next 21 days afloat in the ocean with no water, no food, nothing. And this is when he had to come to God moment, because he's praying. In the middle of praying he said God, what do we do for water? What do we do for food? Literally, after they prayed, fish started jumping in the boat, into their boat with them, and I mean literally they're getting fish because it jumped in the boat after they prayed. And they start getting these rainstorms that would dump water into the boat that they could drink. And I mean, it's just a phenomenal testimony of the guy, but nobody knows it. And John J Pershing was the general in World War I. He was a higher rank than George Washington. They made him a six-star general above Washington during World War I because he was so famous and so known.

Tim Barton

Hang on, Dad. You said John J Pershing. I've never heard of John J Pershing. I've never heard of John J Pershing.

Speaker 3: 6:04

John Mitchell J Pershing.

Tim Barton

But even there I've heard of, was it Black Jack Pershing? That's who I've heard of.

David Barton

That's the same one. John J Pershing, Black Jack Pershing, See.

Tim Barton

I didn't even know the name, See, Rick. That's why you didn't know who that was.

And he said that's old Black Jack Pershing. 

Rick Green

Thank you, tim, for bailing me out here, you would have known instantly Of course yes.

David Barton

So, having said all that, I guess this is a review of the book about to come out. But it's got all these stories and we've just learned that when you go back and tell the stories of the people, the whole thing becomes more interesting. Rather than saying World War I began in November of 1917 for America, go back and look at the people who were in it and what they did. And you know, for me I was, I mean, Eddie Rickenbacker aviation was brand new in World War I I mean the Wright brothers had only flown a few years before.

And so he wants to be a pilot too, and he takes his bicycle up on the barn roof and attaches an umbrella to it and rides his bicycle down the barn roof so he can fly. It didn't quite work that way, but I mean, these are the stories that are a lot of fun. So, having said that, when I saw this sculpture, I was so intrigued with the fact that it was classical, it was old, it told a story. It told the story of the war and going to war and coming home from war. It's just the best sculpture I've seen in a long time. I thought it'd be really fun to get Sabine Owen to talk about this. He's the guy who did the sculpture and, again, in just a few days you'll be able to see this. And when you go to Washington DC, you can see the World War I Memorial, which will be a new memorial there. It's worth seeing, it's worth understanding what's there, and Sabine has a great throwback art style back to the old classical stuff.

Rick Green

Sabin Howard, our special guest. Stay with us. Folks, you're listening to the WallBuilder Show. 

Break

Rick Green

Welcome back to the WallBuilder Show. Thanks for staying with us. Sabin Howard, our special guest today. Sabin, thanks for joining us. 

Sabin Howard

my pleasure. 

Rick Green

Hey, first of all, your website so everybody can go see your artwork, sabinhoward.com. Your sculpture is absolutely amazing. David Barton said we have got to get him on Before we get into some of the specifics of things that you've done, just philosophically. I keep hearing more and more people talk about how the dumbing down of the culture has resulted in a dumbing down of the art, and we don't see the same even architecture in the buildings, let alone the kind of art that you do.

I wondered if you see that same thing out there?

Sabin Howard

Yeah, no, absolutely and I feel it more than anyone acutely. I have been in the arts for forty years and the art narrative has been to block anything of beauty and sacred value and it’s playing forward of something that happened 100 years ago with, like Duchamp's urinal made by a freshman in 1918. It's like enough is enough. It's like return art to the people and give them something beautiful that they can understand and not have to read a book about to understand. So that's where I'm coming from.

Rick Green

Yeah, people that go and see even things that, especially when it brings history to life and you're actually seeing something depicted that happened and it makes it real to you, you can experience it more uh than just uh, than just reading a book. So it's it, it it's huge. Um, I and I don't know, uh, I don't know how much we want to talk about what we uh, uh, future plans and the things you might have coming up next, but this, uh, the project that you just finished. Tell us about what you've been doing and, uh, where people can go to see it.

Sabin Howard

We've been on the uh national world war one Memorial. It's been a nine year, nine-year project.

Global competition 300

Rick Green

 I drove by it the other day. By the way, I didn't get to go see it, but I drove by it. I wanted so, and you know who was bragging on you sam sorbo. I don't know if you know sam, 

Sabin Howard

I know Sam

Well, yeah, that's a personal friend yeah, 

Rick Green

oh man, I'm telling you, bro, she was showing, uh, a video of where she'd been out there with you as she was showing it to everybody backstage at the moms for liberty event. I was just out of dc and I was like man, I don't have time to go.

Sabin Howard

I was staying at the same hotel. 

Rick Green

Were you really, 

Sabin Howard

Marriott?

Rick Green

yeah, that yes Marriott, so yeah oh well, anyway, I just wanted you to know she was. Uh, she was definitely showing it off to everybody backstage in the in the green room and uh, and like I said, I drove by and I didn't get to go see it. I'm sorry, I totally interrupted you,

Sabin Howard

 but go ahead no, it's.

It's a 360 global team competition that we won, and then it's a miracle. It's so radical what we're doing. This is the absurdity of it all. It's like I made a sculpture that's in a traditional Renaissance style, coming out of Western civilization, and everybody, meaning your general populace, not the elites, the general populace are just completely understanding of it. Because, first of all, it's something that's beautiful.

It shows women, men, children, troops. I use models that were soldiers that actually had PTSD. I put their faces on that wall and it's called the Soldier's Journey and the dad, a father allegory for the United States, a bronze movie that you move from the left side to the right and he leaves home, enters into service and then enters into combat, leads that charge. It's very dynamic. And then from that charge there's a cost award. He exits, walking right off the platform towards the viewer, shell-shocked. That's the transformation, the end of divine order and the beginning of majority and chaos. Final scene, parade scene. And then he hands his daughter, the next generation, his helmet. She holds the helmet dividing the future. That's World War II and the beginning of all these never-ending wars that we have been doing for the last hundred years.

Rick Green

The first part, that I think it's the first part. Again, I haven't got to physically see it, but just seeing online at the website where he's literally, you know, moving into war away from his family. I mean, is that the very beginning of it? Or is it because that scene where you see the family with the you know I guess it's his, maybe his mom uh, hands on his shoulders, and then when he's, is it? Am I reading that correctly?

Sabin Howard

Yeah, I, it's his wife. His wife on his shoulders and it’s his daughter and she’s haning her dad the helmet. It’s not open it's closed, so it's uh. Pandora's box has not been released yet ah yes, open. So there you go.

It's like, uh, it's a statement about like, what war did to this planet and because, if you look at it, world war one changes us globally and and you get like this change and going into like this nihilism, existentialism and the end of God. In the back wall there's actually a crucifix that has fallen, right behind a nurse that holds a gassed soldier up that points directly at the shell-shocked soldiers. There's a lot of symbolism here, hidden in meaning that will be interesting for people to decipher. But again, it's not like cryptic, like a lot of the modern art that you see out there. You really get it because it's sculpted in a traditional style.

Rick Green

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, no. Like I said, you literally experience it as you're looking.

Sabin Howard

This is the first time in the history of the globe that a sculpture has been done in reverence of their story, the soldier's journey leaving home, entering into service, battle and then returning home. And I've gotten so many emails and messages and meetings with soldiers, veterans, women that say thank you for what you've done because it reverberates in their hearts. It's like the 13 that fell at Kabul airport deserve a ceremony on the platform in front of the World War I Memorial because their story needs to be respected.

And I know that's in the news right now and it's really interesting that I'm unveiling this sculpture right now and it's like enough with the ridiculosity that governments do in terms of like how they treat their troops. Civilians need to be made aware of like what happens when people sign a contract to their government, their government property, and then they are in service of and that's what I'm in service of them.

Rick Green

You depict the real cost, the personal cost, and not just them, the whole family, because you see that in the sculpture man so powerful, bro, thank you, I wish you know. It's almost like I want you to have a trial. Maybe you already thought about this, a traveling exhibit of this, but I mean, and can you get you know smaller models of it that could be shown in state capitals or anything like that? Is that even a possibility? Because this story needs to be the way you do it is incredibly powerful.

Sabin Howard

What we've done. Look, you know, it's like I think this is more of a destination monument, because part of it is the sheer scale. You're looking at 60 feet, 25 tons and 38 figures. So it's a destination like the Statue of Liberty. You need that kind of stuff on sacred ground.

Yeah, and the beauty of this is 150 yards from the White House, so the visitor center at the White House is right across the street, so I couldn't have gotten a better location to make my statement about, like, what is the umbrella of our history? Our constitution, our flag? I'm very anti-divisive, I'm very anti-forever wars and, as an artist, it's like how would I want to do something about war? It is about war and it's more about human beings, and so that's actually the respect due to people that serve for our country, the sacred deed. Here you go, finally, you are remembered.

Rick Green

Amen, Amen. Well, and even for those policymakers that make the decisions of when to go to war and how to keep us out of war, to constantly be reminded of the personal sacrifice and for the citizenry to be reminded of the personal sacrifice Because, you know, it is Sabin, I'll tell you, there's guys like me that, for you know, first 20 years of my adult life, I just always assumed our country was doing what we had to do and that it was always best and we were just defending freedom and all of those things. And I just I was so naive about the decisions that were being made and assumed that our leaders were doing what was best for the country as a whole. And I have a very different perspective now, and even when you say the words forever wars.

I recognize the cost of politicians making decisions that they didn't have to pay the price for and unfortunately sometimes benefited from. And I'm not saying we should never go. I think we would agree. It's not that you would never go, because sometimes there is an evil that's so great you have to stop. But when you're so caught up in that and not in balancing out the cost, you don't make good decisions.

Sabin Howard

Yeah, this is a very good point you're making and I'm really excited to be on your show because major media markets don't like they don't pay attention to this in the same way and they actually work. They're like the profda for the government. Yeah, oh yeah.

A lot of propaganda is delivered to the general public. That is nonsense, and all these wars could be avoided if the truth were out. And one of the things that was really great about the Vietnam War that's the only thing that I'm going to say that was great about the Vietnam War is got people off the couch to protest war. Why aren't we getting more protests today against what's happening in all the areas around the world that are in conflict and all the people that are dying? It's not the solution, and I think the solution is to start to think about our citizens and the servicemen and take care of the children in this country. I mean, we really have a problem if we're not paying attention to our soil and our citizens.

And the sculpture is my way of pronouncing like. As an artist, this is what I can contribute to the fray. This is what I can give my country and be in service of what that constitution stands for. The freedom is that you can be anything you want to be, and I chose to be an artist. I started from zero at age 19. I couldn't draw Zero at age 19. And I worked my butt off and you know a giant struggle and that's part of life. And here we are, on the other side. I finally got to do something right, you know, and that's an amazing thing. The art's not for me, it's for the community and the people that come to Washington to see our history.

That's a good thing.

Rick Green

Amen, amen, so good, and and I think you know, um, there there's almost a realignment happening out there, uh, politically, because of the of this issue, and a lot of people are paying attention that uh in in a different way, even in my own journey on, on that as well, and and what, what your art will do and what this will do and other things that you're. I don't know if this might be overplaying it, but it's almost like a conscience shocker. You know, right, when you walk, it kind of rattles you out of. Yeah, does that make sense what I'm saying?

Sabin Howard

It's like 100%. The words I like to use are it's like really great art is like a hooligan in a dark alley. That shocks you out of your mundane reality and throws you into a whole different consciousness, and that's what this? Sculpture does.

It's a punch in the chest. Yeah,

Rick Green

 you described it so much better than me. That's why you do this for a living man.

Speaker 4: 21:29

No, it's like I've been doing well 42 years, 80,000 hours of looking at life models, and then I'm very passionate at this point because I will not be held back any longer. I'm building an army behind this sculpture.

We're going to do another one down in Texas, next

Rick Green

 Nice. Oh yeah, bring it to God's country, hey Sabine. God bless you, man, thank you for the effort for the vision. I know this had to be one of those things that you dream about for a long time. You work on for years and years and years, and now the unveiling, and so many millions of people that will be impacted by it.

Sabin Howard

Thanks, for sharing it with us today. My pleasure. Thank you, Rick.

Rick Green

That's Sabin Howard. Stay with us folks. We'll be right back with David and Tim Barton.

Break

Rick Green

Welcome back to the wallbuilder show. Thanks to Sabine Howard for joining us. What a great interview, guys. I mean I loved his passion and obviously he cares about the country you know. So it's not just. I mean I guess maybe I'm too jaded. I just don't think of artists as typically thinking about a lot of the things that we talk about here on the program. It's kind of like when you find a rocker like John Cooper from Skillet or a comedian like Brad Stein. They're in these really art fields but yet they're truly passionate and intellectual and really think through these things, which is really cool to find.

Tim Barton

There's no doubt. I mean I agree with that, rick. He has to be a thoughtful person because the amount of hours you have to put in to do something like this, you have to be committed to this. But I really appreciated what he said. It was something that resonated when he pointed out you shouldn't have to look at art and then go read a book to explain what you're looking at because you don't understand what it is. And so much of the modern perspective. You don't always know, you don't understand what it is, and that's one of the brilliances of what he's done. Dad, as you mentioned, we saw the same article, I think maybe the Epoch Times. Somebody had an article out and I saw it because you sent it to me. And looking at what he did, it is absolutely incredible. And then hearing him explain it, telling the story that you get to go on a journey.

We're going to be in Washington DC actually very soon and I am going to try to find time to go look at this while we are there.

If it's already open, hopefully it is, because this is the kind of thing that you appreciate on a deeper level when you can see that somebody took so much time and the craftsmanship, the artistry, as opposed to a modern art museum where you feel like I could go to my junkyard and do something like what these people have done, instead of recognizing when, again, when God has given you a gift and a talent and you take that and you are working and developing that gift and talent and then you're using it to create something, in this case, that is genuinely incredible, beautiful, that blesses so many people. I'm excited to know there are artists out there committed to doing something of value that is pro-America, that's pro-military, although even right his perspective of the military we don't want these people to die. Well, of course, that is a great faith perspective. With that being said, I'm very excited to see this the next time we're in DC.

David Barton

I will tell you. He came up with a line in the interview that I wrote down. This is a measuring stick. He said, quote current art narrative is there to block anything of beauty and sacred value. Man, what a statement. Current art and he pointed to in 1918, it starts when they take a urinal and turn that into modern art. The current art narrative does block things of beauty and things of sacred value, and he is a throwback to what classical art used to be. And I've got to say congratulations to the National Park Service for choosing him to be the artist to depict World War I. What they have done, that's going to live for a long time If the Lord does not return quickly. That piece of artwork he's done is phenomenal.

Rick Green

Well, great program Appreciate Sabine Howard for joining us today and a little bit different topic for us, but a really good one for us and I love the looking forward to how this will have an impact on the culture for future decision makers when it comes to going to war. Just a great program today. Thanks for joining us. Folks, You've been listening to the Wall Builder Show.