This is how some art works have been described over the past couple of years. These are serious charges, and the emotional content of the charges has stirred up the population. LetŐs take a look at some specific works.Blasphemous: Several specific art works have been charged as blasphemous and anti-religious. Andres Serrano's work entitled "Piss Christ" is a photograph of a crucifix immersed in urine. Another controversial work by a different artist exhibited at the Gallery at Illinois State University showed a representation of Christ with a syringe. These two works have been cited repeatedly as works which are blatantly blasphemous and anti-religious. Yet it is curious that at no time have the artists been asked what they intended by their works, or what the thousands of art enthusiasts who have viewed the works have seen in the works. This is crucial, for art is not black-and-white; it is not a statement in clear language. Art requires interaction between the art work and the viewer.
When Christ was on the earth, what were His concerns and the people He was trying to reach? He ministered to lepers and hung out with prostitutes. He disdained the religious leadership who had lost touch with the truly needy and troubled people of the world. Now, two thousand years later, if Christ were to return, where would we find Him? I believe that He would be in the slums, ministering to the drug addicts and the needy - the people we try to forget and shut out of our world, rather than truly helping them. Christ wouldn't be chatting with the clergy in opulent cathedrals - He would be helping and taking on the burden of those in real spiritual need.
In the early days of Christianity, the crucifix was a horrifying icon - its purpose to remind us of the real agony and pain and humiliation which Christ endured for our sake. In the years since, it has lost its power. The crucifix is a symbol with the power removed. It is used everywhere (all the way to hanging from the rear view mirror in cars) and becomes commonplace. Where is the pain and humiliation of which we must be reminded? Once again, if Christ returned today, He would have to endure the wasteproducts of a society which has been a poor caretaker of the world - pollution, waste of resources Ń and endure the poisons and hate excreted by billions of people. How better to represent this extraordinary cross which would have to be borne today, than to use the natural body fluids which cleanse the poisons from our body?
Traitorous: An artist in Chicago had a work displayed in an art institute entitled "The Proper Way to Show a Flag." The exhibit was structured with an American flag laid out on the floor and a book where patrons could write comments situated in a way that you would have to actually step on the flag in order to get to the book. The Illinois legislature removed the Art Institute's entire arts council funding, which included Arts-in-Education programs, educational arts film series and their exhibit funding.
The flag is a piece of material which represents an idea, and that idea is freedom. However, the flag is constantly used in trivial ways. Politicians use the flag to promote their own candidacy. Liquor stores use the flag in their newspaper ads. A gas station chain uses the flag as a huge billboard to advertise their location. Again, through overuse, and through the lack of an impetus for us to thoughtfully examine our beliefs about freedom and what the flag stands for, the flag loses its meaning. Imagine yourself viewing this exhibit. It's a tougher confrontation to actually think of yourself taking that step onto the flag, than crumpling a newspaper with hundreds of ads that use the flag. People who wanted to record their thoughts in the book were disturbed. Others who were already disturbed by many things going on in our nation were forced to think about them. It forced people to re-think their views on the flag and the freedoms protected in this country. Debates ensued with veterans, protesters and common citizens. And many arts patrons came away from that exhibit with a stronger sense of patriotism simply because they were forced to think seriously.
Homoerotic: This area has probably been one of the most emotional. No one who has been raised in a standard, heterosexual, Christian environment can fail to be at least disturbed by some of the photographs by Robert Mapplethorpe and David Wojnarowicz. One of the most notorious works by Mapplethorpe shows a man with the handle of a bullwhip in his anus. Others depict other aspects of some of the "underground" lifestyle activities which have existed in some gay communities. I first object to the term "homoerotic." I've always thought of "erotic" as something good. The back of a neck can be erotic, and I suppose that it would depend on your orientation as to whether that neck was homoerotic or heteroerotic to you. Let's be straightforward. There are two objections.
(1) Depictions of homosexual love (whether it's two men or two women kissing or caressing or otherwise showing affection outside of "traditional value" approaches). This is not an objection to the art, but to homosexuality, and that should be dealt with in a different arena. Artists represent what exists and their own inner feelings through art. How can you say that a man and woman kissing is art while a two men kissing is not?(2) The more powerful objection is to depiction in art of what many of us would consider some of the darker aspects of some homosexual practices (such as the Mapplethorpe bullwhip photo). I admit that I was disturbed by this photo and found it difficult to look at it. I immediately wanted to turn away and my reaction was "Why is it important for me to see this?" I have friends who are gay, and I have had friends die of AIDS, but this made me extremely uncomfortable. As I had more time to think, I was reminded of a time when a gay friend called me late one night in distress. He needed someone to talk to because he had just been involved with a man he loved who had asked him to participate in a type of sexual activity which went beyond his normal sensibilities. He was very disturbed and shaken by the experience and needed someone to talk with. I was a good friend, so he called me. In the course of the conversation, he described the situation and I was so disturbed by the description that I tuned him out. I was unable to help a friend because I couldn't handle even hearing about his problem. This has haunted me. I was too closed-minded. I still have trouble looking at the photos, but I now look with a better understanding that artwork can help to make you better able to deal with and face problems and situations which are completely foreign to you. I think the same kind of disturbing reaction would happen with an art work depicting a dying malnourished child in Africa. Not everyone will be able to handle it as I have, but if some people find some meaning and value from the art work, it is important art.
Pornographic: Finally, many people are incensed by pornography and, most especially, child pornography. Two photos, again by Mapplethorpe, included naked children with exposed genitalia. The photo most often cited as child pornography by those who have attacked the arts has been the one of five-year-old Jesse McBride. This photo shows a young boy sitting on a chair in an apartment. It has the appearance of a fairly commonplace scene of a child who has been running around naked and stopped to rest. There was no sexual connotation or prurient interest. Many of us have been embarrassed by parents showing pictures of us as babies in the bathtub. Do we accuse our parents of child pornography? Or is it at age 2 that the naked human body becomes obscene? Age 3, 5, 8? Jesse McBride's parents asked Mapplethorpe to take the photo fourteen years ago and gave full permission. Little Jesse himself is now 19 years old and this year cheerfully posed nude in the same chair for the Village Voice to show that he had no objections. Since there have been artists, there have been artists who have depicted the human body. There is beauty there that they see, and it is that beauty which they show us. Whether we see that beauty or not is more a function of how we, as individuals, are conditioned to look at pictures, at art, or at the human body, than it is a function of the art itself.
Politically self-serving: There is one more type of "art" which I wish to discuss. I use quotes because I don't consider it art. This is the material created by people such as the Reverend Donald Wildmon of the American Family Association. For example, he took collages by David Wojnarowicz, focused on small portions of works, enlarged and xeroxed them, labelled them as Wojnarowicz' "pornography" and sent them out to over 200,000 people to protest the NEA and to raise funds. Stripped of context and Wojnarowicz' artistic vision, they were not his work any longer. They were works created by Donald Wildmon without any artistic value, but strictly for greedy self-serving purposes. These new works fit the definition of obscenity and have been forced upon greater numbers of people than the number of people who have experienced the true art works.
Conclusion:
Artists raise questions, they don't give answers. Artists provide a vision of what is, of what was, and of what might be. It is the viewer who supplies the interpretation. The interpretations given above are uniquely those of one individual who happens to be white, male, straight and Christian, interpreting works by artists who are not. Imagine the possible variety of thoughts and visions which can come from the cultural diversity in our nation as different people find their own visions in art! That's the power of art - the value of art - the danger of art - and the reason why the encouragement of true freedom of artistic expression is so important.The Arts: Religious, Patriotic, showing Understanding and Beauty (it's all how you look at it!)
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