The differences between the censorship controversy at the Smithsonian and the attempts to manufacture a censorship controversy at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art could not be more diametrically opposed. The rights of curators to exercise their free speech hangs in the balance of both debates, though.
When John Boehner and some conservative congressman demanded that the National Portrait Gallery remove A Fire in My Belly by the late David Wojnarowicz from the exhibit Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture, the Smithsonian Institution (which directs the NPG) capitulated quite rapidly. This signals a coming dark cloud. An uneasy truce has held over public art exhibitions in the past few decades; a clear sign that offensive material might be present was posted and the family values wolves were held at bay. But with recent electoral gains and a new hypersensitivity about spending, this surprise attack on the arts signals a new front in the no longer dormant cultural wars. Content of any publicly funded space will be scrutinized and condemned on moral as well as fiscal grounds. The brave Andy Warhol Foundation, led by Joel Wachs, has announced that it will be cutting off all grants to any Smithsonian-associated venue. That non-profit groups regularly add funding to public arts programs always escapes mention by the lunatic censorship brigade. Any chance Glenn Beck thanks the Warhol Foundation for the $375,000 they donated to Smithsonian programming in 2010? Suffice to say, the pyrrhic victory of renewed attention to the Wojnarowicz work will come at an ultimately high price: The ghost of Jesse Helms is alive in hundreds of emboldened public officials and inspiring them to kill curatorial freedom and government art neutrality. Wonder how many of them are inconsistently backing net neutrality.
Meanwhile, in sunny Southern California, MOCA director Jeffrey Deitch wisely altered the curation of a coming survey of street art prior to the show's opening. MOCA whitewashed a potentially divisive mural by an artist named only Blu. The blogs and YouTubes burst forth with First Amendment martyrdom, cries of censorship and scathing rants against the museum's decision. The wall of the museum in question was being painted with a repeated pattern of wooden coffins (copyright pic at this link, gotta love how the critics of "the system" milk it better than anyone). An oversized dollar bill was draped on each in lieu of the traditional flag there to honor a fallen veteran. With all the wit of a college newspaper editorial cartoon, the mural was not whitewashed because of its infantile attempt at protest. This north wall of the Geffen Contemporary wing of MOCA straddles an expansive parking lot. The lot is across the street from the Department of Veterans Affairs. But even closer than that, a mere thirty feet away from this North Wall, stands the only official United States memorial to its fallen Asian American Servicemen.
Without even considering the current political climate, suppose you were a museum director in New Orleans and a street artist had made a mural of soldiers drowning ten yards away from a Hurricane Katrina memorial. Does that help with your empathy in this situation? Obviously Deitch had empathy for the population of the Little Tokyo community and how they might interpret a commentary on the sacrifice of their late bothers and fathers.
Some street art fans are crying about the First Amendment violations in this whitewashing but are not considering two things. Do MOCA's curators have a First Amendment right to make the best show possible? Is curating not an artistic process? If a movie director decides that scene in a film detracts from the overall picture and he cuts it, is he censoring the actors who lose screen time as a result? A ratings board or government agency demanding that movie have a scene cut is censorship. The decision to get rid of an artwork that would detract from the overall show is a curatorial decision. Not only is the whitewashing at MOCA not censorship, it is both a brave move to make a show better in the face of controversy as well as to be sensitive on behalf of the local community, something that a shock-and titillation-centric art world is not really known for.
In a brilliant effort to combat the Washington DC censorship at the Smithsonian, Mike Blasenstein stood at the entrance to Hide/Seek with an iPad playing the pulled Wojnarowicz video. According to the Washington Post, Blasenstein believes he has been banned for life. Meanwhile, L.A. being L.A., the spotlight-seeking opportunists crawl out of woodwork to insist Deitch is a West Coast Boehner. In DC, Blasenstein wanted to interact with museum visitors. L.A. is street art cheerleaders just want to interact with the media, even if they have to whitewash any curatorial right to free speech in order to be heard. The controversy in L.A. will die down, the street art show will go on and the blowhards will pontificate about the constitution. When you finally do tire of the street artist defenders crying about the First Amendment, just bring up the Fifth Amendment. Like impassioned defenses of free speech, some Fifth Amendment property rights activists would argue that when a street artist trespasses on your property to make art, you can shoot and kill the aspiring Blu wannabe. I would never advocate something this harsh, but if you do shoot the artist, don't whitewash the "artwork"... that might be censorship.
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Paul Brandeis Raushenbush: The Smithsonian, the Cross and David Wojnarowicz
Why is the fact that the US Federal Government was not involved in the MOCA case relevant?
Why is it a signal of a “dark cloud” when a curator responds to cries from offended Christians by removing a work from display at a particular museum, but “brave” for a curator to destroy a work of art because of perceived potential (though not actual) offence?
Do you really think that the deaths of those responding to Hurricane Katrina are in anyway analogous to the deaths of American troops in our current wars for petty gain if any at all, coupled the ongoing censoring aspects of the current wars by the US government, and the high costs of war paid by American tax dollars?
Is it really empathy, when the representatives of the community you “feel for” have stated that they were aware of the work, but did not complain.
Is curating not a curatorial process? In other words, a process marked by care, research, and overseeing? (i.e. not being over seas!).
If curating were an artistic process, how would this justify a curators actions? If governance were argued to be an artistic process (as it has been in various ways throughout history) would this justify Boehner or the MPAA?
Is not the decision on the part of the Smithsonian a curatorial decision “ to get rid of an artwork that would detract from the overall show” in the eyes of certain publics?
When MOCA asked the artist to paint the mural they didn't give him any restrictions. They didn't request him to paint X,Y, or Z. When they hired him they gave him license to create his art as he saw fit. If they wanted something safe they should have hired a commercial graphic artist and I'm sure they could have gotten something safe.
BLU made a true statement. That our war dead mostly die so other people can make money. That has been true since the Civil War. The best art makes a statement. It makes some people angry.
This art was not given the chance to do that because it was censored. Call it what you will but that's what it was. Especially when you see the reasons given.
The curator didn't want to offend the veterans? I'm a veteran and I'm telling you that painting was the most honest thing I've seen in a while.
And, as I replied to someone else about this piece of art, I don't even know it was an anti-war statement. It could have been about the 30,000 killed in Mexico's drug revolution or the high cost of dying.
Thanks for making me laugh though. Your second sentence has excused so many pieces of crap being passed off as art and is such a cliche that I feel bad for you having to resort to that as an arguement.
I have been going to modern art shows for over twenty years and have had to listen ad nauseum to curators talk about "artist statements" and "meanings." Now, THANK GOD, I have an expert, such as yourself to let me know that art should not make a statement! I also wish to thank you for giving me such a good laugh today. Your second sentence has been used to justify so much bad, untalented, unispired crap peddling itself as art over the years that I am sure you pulled it verbatim from some bad MOCA catalog.
If I feel like if I will wear my uniform on Veterans Day and protest wherever the Hell I want. I'm a veteran and I served to give people the right to have free speech. I get that. Most veterans get that. I think you'd be surprised how many of the families would rather have their relative back than a memorial.
Finally, I don't know what Blu's message was. Was it an anti-war statement? Was it about the thirty thousand dead in Mexico's drug revolution this year? The high cost of dying? The cheapening of life?
While the artwork may not be great it could be interpreted several different ways and creates conversation. Which is better than most of the crap MOCA foists upon us.
So, I guess my point can be symbolized by the following concept. When there's a marriage, either one of the couple can call things quits. It's their right. But when an outside party comes in and purposefully tries to destroy the marriage... well, that's a no-no. (Not the best analogy, but hey, I'm just some crackpot posting on a blog! Bleh.)
After reading your commentary, I find myself pretty much completely agreeing with you... which I wouldn't have guessed having at first read the headline. It does seem like MOCA made a mistake in not foreseeing the possible outcomes, both positive & negative, of commissioning this art... but in the end, it's their choice to show the art they want to show and to change their choice before the show officially happens. (In this case -- as you pointed out -- timing is everything. Had they done the whitewashing during the run of the show, I think it would have been a completely different story. In fact, had they done it BECAUSE there were complaints during the run of the show... again, a different story.) I would also argue that it is the nature of "street art" that it is by definition "transitory" and "impermanent" and what has happened was inevitable in the greater timescale of events. I would also argue that the whole thing seems perhaps a bit "sensational" and makes me think that the whole shebang -- whitewashing and all -- was pre-planned by all concerned parties. Everyone involved gets some exposure and hype, and Blu's message reaches perhaps an even bigger audience than had it been left alone.
(more to follow in my second comment, which both will hopefully be posted...
And making it up as he goes along, ensuring everyone knows he has no respect for street art at all, nor anyone's opinions other than his own, and those in the mainstream designer art set.
What the hell has the Blu/Moca issue to do with the Boehner/Smithsonian issue?
Both are certainly an issue.
Both are different in context.
Neither are manufactured: and Gleason's pathetic, cliched, elitist dissing of the folk perturbed by Deitch's whitewash decision is nothing more than what the newspapers did to sites like this: who cares; their opinion matters not.
I can only assume you feel the same way - just a bunch of kids not doing real art, right old man?
You guys know better.
Sing it.
Smugly.
Especially street art.
Couldn't have that - it wouldn't be elite art if those troublesome youths wished to do what it is that garnered attention in the first place...
You people.
Go sift in your dealer gallery.
The Smithsonian is indeed a much more troubling situation. Incoming Republicans who have no knowledge or interest in art whatsoever are already going out of their way to be offended by exhibitions they'd never attend just to shut down anything that's not directly for them or part of their agenda.
But, I agree that MOCA had to right to whitewash the mural.
Curating is done before a show. Somehow we're supposed to believe that Blu acted outside of supervision or staff foreknowledge of the content? That at minimum reveals mismanagement that should be accounted for, and not just dismissed. This is a major institution, not a warehouse show.
The rationale for covering up the work is that it might be offensive to some veterans. I find it 1000X more offensive to soldiers and veterans that the US government would lie us into wars in which millions of people are killed (from Vietnam to Iraq to Afghanistan to Pakistan to Yemen...) while crony-connected corporations reap huge profits. Blu had the guts to point to the truth.
Once the work went up, it became Deitch's responsibility to defend Blu. Yet he says he acted pre-emptively on his own to cover the mural. He didn't wait for anyone to complain. More than anything, this speaks volumes about Deitch's opinion on war and the value of protest against unjust use of power.
This is an embarrassment to the LA art scene. I think the outrage being expressed is perfectly on point.
If this makes me a spotlight-seeking pontificating blowhard opportunist, call me what you will. I respect your right to your opinion. This is mine.
Additionally, street art thrives on context; maybe the work is much more powerful because it is the proximity of the memorial and the Veterans Affairs building. Sure, maybe the imagery is a bit ham-handed and without being able to see the work in person, I can't really tell but I do like the way the rows of coffins mimic the rows of parked cars ..... I think it may have been a pretty good setting but, of course, that is up to the curator.
I posted elsewhere that this is either a case very bad management/poor PR or a very savvy comment on the contextual nature of street art and the very common consequences of that nature ..... or maybe I'm reading to much into the whole thing .....