'Hardhats' full of social irony By JAMES AUER Journal Sentinel art critic Last Updated: Jan. 16, 2003 Irony, contradiction and a certain cartoon-like crudeness lend pith and point to the politically charged paintings of Robert Colescott. Take A Look Photo/MAM "Hardhats," Robert Colescott's 1987 oil, is a recent addition to the Milwaukee Art Museum's permanent collection. Colescott's 1987 oil, "Hardhats," is a recent addition to the permanent collection of the Milwaukee Art Museum. Born in 1925 in Oakland, Calif., Colescott is one of the few African-Americans to have reached the top rung in the mainstream art world. Adept at appropriation, the art of recycling ideas taken from high and popular culture, he represented the United States with a solo show at the Venice Bienniale in 1997. Like his brother, Wisconsin-based painter and printmaker Warrington Colescott, Robert Colescott has a well-developed social conscience and the wit and skill to turn it into slashingly effective imagery. Colescott says his pictures "are not about race, they are about perceptions." He is as comfortable dealing with problems of sexism as he is with the horrors of racism. "Hardhats" is an example. It explores inter-related stereotypes, sexual and racial. A construction worker, wearing a hard hat and happily engaged on a work site, interacts playfully with his sullen wife, who wears a pan as her own hard hat. She seems upset at having been called away from her kitchen sink and dirty dishes. Adding a further note of injustice is the presence of two African-American construction workers, neither of whom enjoys the prominence given to the white workers. Indeed, one of them appears to be serving as a chair for the disaffected housewife. "Hardhats" measures 84 by 72 inches. It was a gift to the museum from collectors Judith and Howard Tullman. Journal Sentinel writers "Take a Look" at one work of art each Friday in OnWisconsin.com Live.