"Caution! Religion" Takes on New Meaning: Museum Director and Curator Convicted
The New York Times reports that director Yuri V. Samodurov and a curator of the Sakharov Museum were convicted of inciting religious hatred with an exhibition titled “Caution! Religion.” According to the ruling, the court found the exhibition “openly insulting and blasphemous,” and fined both the director and curator the equivalent of $3,600 each, although both could have been imprisoned. One artist who also faced criminal charges was acquitted.
Here are some excerpts from the article:
Aleksandr V. Chuyev, a member of the lower house of Parliament who played a role in pressing prosecutors to bring criminal charges against the museum agreed that the verdict would set a precedent, but one he considered healthy. “The people and the authorities now understand that religion and the feelings of believers should not be touched on…They should understand that their rights end where the other person’s begin.”
Interesting…let’s read on:
The exhibition had been open only four days before six men from an Orthodox church in Moscow ransacked the museum, damaging or destroying many of the 45 works on display. Criminal charges against four of the men were dropped, while two others were acquitted last year in a trial that led to the new charges against Mr. Samodurov; the museum's curator, Lyudmila V. Vasilovskaya, who was also convicted and fined on Monday; and one of the artists, Anna Mikhalchuk.
And so the hypocrisy between one person’s rights and another’s continues with religion being the defining barrier between who is protected and who is not. The religious nuts who feel that it is ok to destroy another person’s property are clearly doing the work of the Good Lord and thus their actions are justified. Unbelievable.
In a related story, an article published in the April 2005 issue of Artnews titled “The Show that Had All Buenos Aires Talking” discusses the intolerance to artistic freedom in another part of the world. The Recoleta Cultural Center held a retrospective for Argentine artist León Ferrari, whose career is heavily marked by political and anti-religious themes.
Here are some excerpts:
The retrospective centered on one such work, made to protest the Vietnam War, a figure of Christ crucified on a U.S. fighter plane; it was titled Western and Christian Civilization (1965). Several of Ferrari’s collages in the show blended religious motifs and sexually explicit images; one work included a figure of Christ being fed through a food grater.
Most of the art on display emerged from the artist’s opposition to the Christian concept of hell, which he describes to Artnews as the “belief by part of the population that others deserve to be punished simply for not sharing their beliefs. It is the mother of all discrimination.” He adds, “The heart of the issue is that the church cannot accept that part of the country does not agree with its ideas.”
Ahh…the sweet, refreshing sound of truth and reason. A judge’s ruling closed the exhibition down for 18 days although an appeal won by the cultural center, backed by city hall, re-opened the exhibition. Despite incredible success, the Recoleta closed the exhibition a month ahead of schedule with Ferrari “exhausted” by the legal wrangling.
The idea of art as contentious and offensive seems acceptable so long as the topic of religion is exempt. When "Sensation" was at the Brooklyn Museum, no other work raised hell like Chris Ofili’s Holy Virgin Mary—not Jake and Dino Chapman’s prepubescent mutant girls with penis noses in Zygotic acceleration, biogenetic, de-sublimated libidinal model or the same girls conjoined in sexually explicit poses with one another in Tragic Anatomies; not Marc Quinn’s bust of himself sculpted out of his own frozen and coagulated blood; not Marcus Harvey’s portrait of child killer Myra Hindley composed of handprints of young children (the most offensive work to British audiences). In a more recent exhibition, the Jersey City Museum recently added a warning to audiences entering their galleries to see Wei Dong’s They Can Do Anything, which depicts an Asian crucifixion scene and yes…Christ is Asian (how scandalous!).
So the question remains: What is offensive and should art that criticizes religious or political establishments be censored? I am a staunch opponent to censorship, particularly in the arts, and I think that it is a museum’s responsibility to engage in meaningful and constructive discourse about a wide range of topics, including politics and religion. Certainly they are sensitive topics and they should be handled delicately during exhibition planning. Exhibitions which include works that address such sensitive topics should be evaluated prior to their opening and throughout the course of the exhibition to gauge the effectiveness of measures instated to quell any potential offense taken by visitors. Museum’s can’t possibly satisfy every person who walks through their doors nor should they attempt to. If people are going to a museum to see art they should expect to see things they like and things they don’t, things they can relate to and things they can not, things that make sense to them and things they can not understand. Art is not always beautiful and it doesn’t always make you happy—that’s part of its greatness.
We live in a world of hypocrisy and self-righteousness, run by an increasing number of Christian fanatics attempting to limit the expression of those who hold opposing views, ideas, and values. The case against the Sakharov Museum and its employees is just the latest impact it’s had on museums and cultural institutions. You know, I can’t recall an instance where an exhibition consisting of works of a religious nature had a disclaimer outside of it that said “Warning: The Content of This Exhibition May be Offensive to Some Visitors.” It is also quite seldom that one hears of an instance where an image of violence, even in the most graphic and extreme expression, stirs a controversy as emotional as one over religion or politics. This doesn’t surprise me but it is saddening.
You know what I find offensive? Images of dead Iraqis in the streets of Baghdad or tortured detainees degraded and humiliated, breaking news interruptions to originally scheduled broadcasting to tell me the Pope has a urinary tract infection or that Michael Jackson is running late to a court date for his molestation trial, the checkout girl at the supermarket telling me to have a blessed day. But you know what? I get over it and I move on. Even now, when I look at those works by the Chapman brothers, I get a visceral response but that’s what art is supposed to do. Art isn’t always about still-lifes with sunflowers or pretty landscapes, it’s also about things that punch you in the stomach and make you feel sick, it’s about expressing emotions and not just the good ones, it’s about questioning the world we live in, how we see it, and how we experience it. If the artwork helps you make sense of it then great, if not then leave me and everyone else alone and go back to your bubble where it’s nice and safe, where no one asks questions and everyone thinks the same thing.
UPDATE: Here is a column which I found on Reason Magazine's website. It's a good article written before the conviction. And here is the story as covered by the BBC.
Here are some excerpts from the article:
Aleksandr V. Chuyev, a member of the lower house of Parliament who played a role in pressing prosecutors to bring criminal charges against the museum agreed that the verdict would set a precedent, but one he considered healthy. “The people and the authorities now understand that religion and the feelings of believers should not be touched on…They should understand that their rights end where the other person’s begin.”
Interesting…let’s read on:
The exhibition had been open only four days before six men from an Orthodox church in Moscow ransacked the museum, damaging or destroying many of the 45 works on display. Criminal charges against four of the men were dropped, while two others were acquitted last year in a trial that led to the new charges against Mr. Samodurov; the museum's curator, Lyudmila V. Vasilovskaya, who was also convicted and fined on Monday; and one of the artists, Anna Mikhalchuk.
And so the hypocrisy between one person’s rights and another’s continues with religion being the defining barrier between who is protected and who is not. The religious nuts who feel that it is ok to destroy another person’s property are clearly doing the work of the Good Lord and thus their actions are justified. Unbelievable.
In a related story, an article published in the April 2005 issue of Artnews titled “The Show that Had All Buenos Aires Talking” discusses the intolerance to artistic freedom in another part of the world. The Recoleta Cultural Center held a retrospective for Argentine artist León Ferrari, whose career is heavily marked by political and anti-religious themes.
Here are some excerpts:
The retrospective centered on one such work, made to protest the Vietnam War, a figure of Christ crucified on a U.S. fighter plane; it was titled Western and Christian Civilization (1965). Several of Ferrari’s collages in the show blended religious motifs and sexually explicit images; one work included a figure of Christ being fed through a food grater.
Most of the art on display emerged from the artist’s opposition to the Christian concept of hell, which he describes to Artnews as the “belief by part of the population that others deserve to be punished simply for not sharing their beliefs. It is the mother of all discrimination.” He adds, “The heart of the issue is that the church cannot accept that part of the country does not agree with its ideas.”
Ahh…the sweet, refreshing sound of truth and reason. A judge’s ruling closed the exhibition down for 18 days although an appeal won by the cultural center, backed by city hall, re-opened the exhibition. Despite incredible success, the Recoleta closed the exhibition a month ahead of schedule with Ferrari “exhausted” by the legal wrangling.
The idea of art as contentious and offensive seems acceptable so long as the topic of religion is exempt. When "Sensation" was at the Brooklyn Museum, no other work raised hell like Chris Ofili’s Holy Virgin Mary—not Jake and Dino Chapman’s prepubescent mutant girls with penis noses in Zygotic acceleration, biogenetic, de-sublimated libidinal model or the same girls conjoined in sexually explicit poses with one another in Tragic Anatomies; not Marc Quinn’s bust of himself sculpted out of his own frozen and coagulated blood; not Marcus Harvey’s portrait of child killer Myra Hindley composed of handprints of young children (the most offensive work to British audiences). In a more recent exhibition, the Jersey City Museum recently added a warning to audiences entering their galleries to see Wei Dong’s They Can Do Anything, which depicts an Asian crucifixion scene and yes…Christ is Asian (how scandalous!).
So the question remains: What is offensive and should art that criticizes religious or political establishments be censored? I am a staunch opponent to censorship, particularly in the arts, and I think that it is a museum’s responsibility to engage in meaningful and constructive discourse about a wide range of topics, including politics and religion. Certainly they are sensitive topics and they should be handled delicately during exhibition planning. Exhibitions which include works that address such sensitive topics should be evaluated prior to their opening and throughout the course of the exhibition to gauge the effectiveness of measures instated to quell any potential offense taken by visitors. Museum’s can’t possibly satisfy every person who walks through their doors nor should they attempt to. If people are going to a museum to see art they should expect to see things they like and things they don’t, things they can relate to and things they can not, things that make sense to them and things they can not understand. Art is not always beautiful and it doesn’t always make you happy—that’s part of its greatness.
We live in a world of hypocrisy and self-righteousness, run by an increasing number of Christian fanatics attempting to limit the expression of those who hold opposing views, ideas, and values. The case against the Sakharov Museum and its employees is just the latest impact it’s had on museums and cultural institutions. You know, I can’t recall an instance where an exhibition consisting of works of a religious nature had a disclaimer outside of it that said “Warning: The Content of This Exhibition May be Offensive to Some Visitors.” It is also quite seldom that one hears of an instance where an image of violence, even in the most graphic and extreme expression, stirs a controversy as emotional as one over religion or politics. This doesn’t surprise me but it is saddening.
You know what I find offensive? Images of dead Iraqis in the streets of Baghdad or tortured detainees degraded and humiliated, breaking news interruptions to originally scheduled broadcasting to tell me the Pope has a urinary tract infection or that Michael Jackson is running late to a court date for his molestation trial, the checkout girl at the supermarket telling me to have a blessed day. But you know what? I get over it and I move on. Even now, when I look at those works by the Chapman brothers, I get a visceral response but that’s what art is supposed to do. Art isn’t always about still-lifes with sunflowers or pretty landscapes, it’s also about things that punch you in the stomach and make you feel sick, it’s about expressing emotions and not just the good ones, it’s about questioning the world we live in, how we see it, and how we experience it. If the artwork helps you make sense of it then great, if not then leave me and everyone else alone and go back to your bubble where it’s nice and safe, where no one asks questions and everyone thinks the same thing.
UPDATE: Here is a column which I found on Reason Magazine's website. It's a good article written before the conviction. And here is the story as covered by the BBC.
posted by Corey Wyckoff at 12:51 AM
2 Comments:
I'm glad you're here, writing about art- something that seems to be mentioned in the world news less and less often. Especially because it's possible to never know any of this has even happened, even if you read the news every day on CNN.com, drive to work with NPR, and catch the evening news. And that bothers me.
Mark-if I understand things correctly, the exhibition wasn't about bashing religion, but about criticizing it by drawing attention to the justification of things like commercialism, war, or inequality all in the name of religion. The fact that charges against six men from a church in Moscow who successfully damaged or destroyed many of the works in the exhibition were dropped indicates that violence is an acceptable means of articulating disagreement and that's a problem. People who find constructive and non-violent means of expressing dissent and attempt to actually raise issues for discussion are apparently the criminals.
Anonymous-thanks for your support.
You're right, news in the art world often does get ignored by mainstream media, in part I think because the average American isn't particularly interested in art and art issues, as sad as that may sound. I think this has something to do with why there is such an uproar when an exhibition raises questions or expresses discontent with generally accepted establishments and institutions, religious, political or otherwise. Luckily there are a few good sources for news listed in the Links list on my blog. Feel free to check them out and continue reading here at Elective Affinities.
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