Garret Bock "The Abduction of Billy the Kid"

The Abduction of Billy the Kid, Linocut, 2026 by Garret Bock

 

This piece commemorates the Alien Abduction of Billy the Kid.  On July 14th 1881 Billy was beamed aboard a UFO at Ft. Sumner, New Mexico and never seen again.


All joking aside, this linocut is a fusion of Western storytelling and Science Fiction.  Both genres dominated post war American movies, TV shows, books and more.  Pop culture’s vision of the American West is probably just as fictional as Aliens. They share a surprising amount of similarities and fit together well. 


I’ve printed this piece in a variety of colors.  The palette of this print was inspired by a building I saw outside Las Crusas, New Mexico while traveling to see Billy’s grave.  The grave is only a little more than an hour drive from Roswell; the site of an alleged UFO crash in 1947.  Their proximity in location is just another example of how tied together Aliens and Cowboys can be. 

 

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