A Daring Art Exhibit Draws Censorship In Vienna

The Leopold Museum in Vienna has put together a daring show about the male figure in art over the last 200 years called "Nude Male: From 1800 to Today".  On the surface, that may not sound controversial but in the world of museums, the male nude has always taken a backseat to the female form and this is a rare exhibit which focuses solely on men.  

The poster for the exhibit, a photo of 3 naked soccer players by French photograph team Pierre et Gilles, has caused a stir though forcing the museum to self-censor the image in outdoor advertising. Of course, if you walk around NYC and many other European cities, you'll see naked women 50 feet tall on billboards (and in much more erotic poses than these sporty fellows) which haven't cause much of a stir. But the minute you have a naked man in public view, it's the end of the world as we know it. And in Vienna, the museum quickly caved to the flurry of protests.

If you're interested, you can see the uncensored version online along with some other selections from this wide-ranging exhibit, which includes works by Ego Schiele, Andy Warhol and Louise Bourgeios. It would be great to see this kind of survey at the Met or even the MoMA but that might be asking a lot.  However, the Brooklyn Museum was recently brave enough to host the traveling version of the Smithsonian's Hide/Seek exhibit....so maybe this will be coming to a borough near you in the next few years.

Space Shuttle Discovery Ready For Its Final Flight To Smithsonian

The space shuttle Discovery will make it's final flight tomorrow atop a special 747, traveling from the Kennedy Space Center to the Smithsonian's Air & Space Hanger at Dulles International Airport.  The Washington Post has a cool little animation today about the shuttle's final journey and how they got it on top of the 747 above.  On April 19th, they will tow the shuttle in to it's final resting place at the Udvar-Hazy Museum, as it replaces the space shuttle Enterprise which will be coming to New York City this summer for display at the USS Intrepid.  

I remember when they flew the Enterprise around the Beltway on it's journey to Dulles back in 1985 and I actually got to see it on top of the 747.  This time, though, NASA is not releasing the exact flight plan due to security concerns. It's too bad as it was so cool to see the shuttle flying, even if it was on the back of a 747.  I think it was extra exciting too because it was like a real life version of the opening scene from the James Bond film MOONRAKER, minus the disastrous fate of the 747 when the shuttle is fired up and stolen by the bad guys! That was awesome...if totally unrealistic.

Rethinking The Grounds Of The Washington Monument

When I was in Washington for the holiday weekend, I checked out a fascinating exhibit at the National Building Museum called "Unbuilt Washington".  It is a 200 year plus retrospective of plans for the nation's captial that never reached fruition, like a Versailles-esque White House on Meridian Hill, a Smithsonian Gallery of Art with a shockingly modern design that would have replaced the Castle, a 200 foot tall water fountain for a Teddy Roosevelt Memorial (where the Jefferson now stands), and, the strangest by far, an elevated freeway around the perimeter of the national Mall.  It's an amazing and often shocking look at what could have been and, for the most part, fortunately never was.

Part of the exhibit was dedicated to the tortured history of one memorial that has become so iconic, it's hard to imagine it never having been built.  The Washington Monument was problematic from the start because President Washington had explicitly asked that no memorials be built in his name, wishing to avoid the godly hero-worship which had caused Europe so much trouble. But his wish was ignored and and, after many grand designs came and went, eventually a simple obelisk was built...over the course of 50 years, with the project stalling a third-built for 30 of those.

Now there is a plan afoot to rethink the design of the Washington Monument's plain, open field grounds.  There is a public competition entering the final phase where you can vote on your favorite design.  Some imagine a national amphitheater in marble that would hold 3,000 people, others a landscaped and wooded forest.  You can see the entires here and vote on the site as well.  Winners will be featured in the exhibit and their ideas presented to the National Park Service as they consider what to do with the grounds...after they fix the actual monument, still closed due to earthquake damage.

The Furor Grows Over Censorship At The Smithsonian

A couple weeks ago, I posted about the removal of a work of art from the Smithsonian's groundbreaking exhibit about gender identity, Hide/Seek.  After criticism from the Catholic League and Weeper of the House John Boehner, the Portrait Gallery caved and removed a video by artist/activist David Wojnaorwociz called "Fire In My Belly", which showed ants on a cross as an analogy to his AIDS diagnosis.  The artist died in 1992.

Since then, the furor has only grown.  And rightly so.  This sort of censorship by the Smithsonian is totally unacceptable behavior by a national cultural institution and more like something one would expect in the old Soviet Union.  The repercussions of this disastrous decision continue to grow.  Last week, Canadian artist AA Bronson asked to have his work, a stunning wall-sized photo of the artist's partner a few minutes after his death from AIDS, removed from the exhibit.  This piece is easily one of the most powerful in the exhibit and its loss would be devastating.  Currently, it's not clear if the artist has the right to remove it as the piece is on loan from a Canadian museum.  But his request, sent directly to the head of the museum, makes it clear how strongly artists believe that this act of censorship cannot stand.

Meanwhile, here in New York, there was a previously scheduled panel with the exhibit's curators Jonathan Katz and David Ward at the NY Public Library on Wednesday.  Though they publicly stated that the museums' action were "abhorrent", the curators tried to keep the focus on the fact that it's still a landmark show for the Smithsonian and that there are 104 other works worthy of discussion.  However, the audience was not having it.  In the Q/A, they were asked angry and pointed questions and there were even attempts to start a chant to restore the works.  This weekend, there was also street protest here in NYC which drew hundreds of people angered by the situation.  They marched up the Museum Mile to the Smithsonians' Cooper-Hewitt Museum demanding the video be restored.  There was also a protest in Washington last week where people gathered in front of the Portrait Gallery wearing masks of the artist and projecting the video onto the building's facade.

From all this activity, it's clear that this issue is not going away and that the Smithsonian has to address this crisis.  Of course, their initial action was taken because their bottom line was threatened by Boehner's veiled threat that the funding of the museum could be at stake.  Unfortunately, the real financial threat could come from elsewhere.  The Warhol Foundation has threatened to cancel it's funding of the museum and other donors are considering doing the same.  The Smithsonian must take a stronger stand against this sort of "artistic bullying".  Their future depends on it.

Smithsonian Caves To Right-Wing Art Critics

In a shocking move that is more reminiscent of 1990 then 2010, the Smithsonian Institution today removed a piece of work by renowed East Village artist David Wojnarowicz because of criticism from not-so-renowned art critics Catholic League President William Donahue and Rep. John Boehner.  The video, which depicts Christ on the cross crawling with ants as an AIDS analogy, is part of an remarkable new exhibit at the National Portrait Gallery about gender identity and gay sexuality, the first such show that the Smithsonian has even mounted.

But now the gay-haters have latched onto this groundbreaking exhibit as a case of taxpayer waste, which is absurd when the amount of federal money spent on the show pales in comparison to the earmarks and general pork barreling that goes on up on Capitol Hill everyday. Regardless, the new Speaker of The House felt that American taxpayer money shouldn't be used for the exhibit and that "it's symbolic of the arrogance Washington routinely applies to thousands of spending decisions involving Americans' hard-earned money." 


Of coure, the real arrogance here is Boner's assumption that he, as a elected official, should be the judge and jury of what is and isn't art.  Perhaps Boner should focus on slightly more important matters of governance, like, you know, maybe reducing the federal deficit before we bankrupt the country?  Or how about repealing "Dont'Ask, Don't Tell" now that the US military's report says they are fine with it?  I don't think it's a coincidence that the day after that report came out, this is what Mr. Boner is focused on.  In a nutshell, he should stick to his job and leave the art to the artists.