"Out of concern for the safety of its staff, visitors, and participating artists, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum has decided against showing the art works Dogs That Cannot Touch Each Other (2003)..."

"... Theater of the World (1993), and A Case Study of Transference (1994) in its upcoming exhibition Art and China after 1989: Theater of the World. Although these works have been exhibited in museums in Asia, Europe, and the United States, the Guggenheim regrets that explicit and repeated threats of violence have made our decision necessary."

Fast Company reports.

We were talking about this controversy a week ago in "The most fatuous art-talk I've ever heard." I said: "[The Guggenheim] should not be showing a video of the animal cruelty and palming off fatuous rhetoric calling us into debasement and numbness as if it were an elevated accomplishment."

Now, the museum is doing what I wanted, but not for the reason I wanted. I guess there really were some threats of violence, and I hate that, but I wish the Guggenheim showed some consideration toward those of us who made ethical arguments in an entirely peaceful way. It clearly insists that without the threats, the show would have gone on:

As an arts institution committed to presenting a multiplicity of voices, we are dismayed that we must withhold works of art. Freedom of expression has always been and will remain a paramount value of the Guggenheim.

That last sentence is, of course, a lie. I'm virtually certain that the expression of racist, sexist, and homophobic ideas is subordinated to higher values. Does anyone believe that if an artist tormented real human children in the equivalent of Dogs That Cannot Touch Each Other that the rejection of child abuse would not find a position above freedom of expression.

Now, the Guggenheim does say "a paramount value." But how many "paramount" values can you have? I think pairing "a" with "paramount" is like pairing "very" with "unique."