१ ऑक्टोबर, २०२०

"But the people who run our great institutions do not want trouble. They fear controversy. They lack faith in the intelligence of their audience."

"And they realize that to remind museum-goers of white supremacy today is not only to speak to them about the past, or events somewhere else. It is also to raise uncomfortable questions about museums themselves—about their class and racial foundations. For this reason, perhaps, those who run the museums feel the ground giving way beneath their feet. If they feel that in four years, 'all this will blow over,' they are mistaken. The tremors shaking us all will never end until justice and equity are installed. Hiding away images of the KKK will not serve that end."

From "Open Letter: On Philip Guston Now" (Google docs), via "The Philip Guston Show Should Be Reinstated/An open letter, signed by nearly 100 artists, curators and critics, accuses four museums of 'hiding away' from controversy. A long postponement is an admission these institutions are not up to the job" (NYT). We talked about this controversy on the blog a few days ago, here.

The NYT art critic Jason Farago writes:
For as the artists suggest in their open letter, the reason to reinstate “Philip Guston Now” is not, or certainly not only, because he passes some anti-racist litmus test. It is to continue and accelerate the transformation of our museums into institutions that can do justice to the work of all artists and the experiences of all publics. A museum unequipped to exhibit Guston will never be able to show truly “problematic” artists like Paul Gauguin or Francis Picabia — but just as inevitably it will fail [Matthew] Barney’s mythopoetic melding of bodies, [Joan] Jonas’s culturally hybrid meditations on gender and climate, [Adrian] Piper’s exacting probes of self and stereotypes.
Barney, Jonas, and Piper are all signatories of the open letter. The NYT critic says, "Really, a museum unequipped to exhibit Guston is barely a museum at all, or else only a museum in the most derogatory sense: a dusty storehouse of dead things." And then he suddenly, in his last paragraph, talks about... can you guess?
Trump!
This week, at the first presidential debate, the incumbent was asked if he would condemn white supremacy outright. His response was to tell one of these white supremacist groups to “stand back and stand by.” It was only the latest reminder that our art institutions cannot afford anything less than a united front against racism and anti-Semitism, and should not be spooked by their own shadows when actual hatred is already at the gates.
I'm sorry but this is incoherent! You can't say that museums must courageously present truly “problematic” artists and that they must staunchly maintain "a united front against racism and anti-Semitism." The NYT article trips over itself and so does the open letter which decries the museum's timidity about getting into trouble because the meaning of the paintings isn't blatantly obvious but also vigorously insists that that the artist's racial politics are exactly right. They say, "Guston’s paintings insist that justice has never yet been achieved." Paintings insist.

No, they don't. And that shouldn't be the point. Paintings — unless they're raw propaganda — don't insist. They entice and intrigue. They scare and confuse. They make you worry that you're thinking something forbidden and dangerous. They don't soothe you and reinforce your pre-existing, pre-sanitized ideas. They're transgressive! They're complicated! Or who gives a damn about art?  What if high art and museums are white supremacy? Now, that's a scary idea for the trustees. Pity them in their need to withdraw for 4 years to work that one out or to hope that the culture calms down and lets them live with their doubts and decrepitude.

७३ टिप्पण्या:

Mike (MJB Wolf) म्हणाले...

I agree that progressives have a life to answer for in the way they’ve run America’s institutions. They live to flirt with haters. They live criminals and anarchy. Progressivism is a mental illness dignified by oikophobia above all else.

CJinPA म्हणाले...

The museum heads thought pulling the show was advancing left-wing politics. Critics were outraged. "No, showing Guston is how you advance left-wing politics!"

All parties agree that the only art that should be displayed is art that advances left-wing politics, the debate is over how best to do it.

mccullough म्हणाले...

The Times will be gone in four years.

mezzrow म्हणाले...

"The tremors shaking us all will never end until justice and equity are installed. Hiding away images of the KKK will not serve that end."

Installed. There's that word again.

We gotta install microwave ovens
Custom kitchen deliveries
We gotta move these refrigerators
We gotta move these color tvs


Who is installing the custom kitchen of our future?

Mike (MJB Wolf) म्हणाले...

One cannot be in charge of art, culture, education, public discourse, entertainment and political debates — in other words OUR INSTITUTIONS — and at the same time declare that people who are not in charge and do not run these things of poisoning them with INSTITUTIONAL RACISM. YOU GUYS RUN ALL THE INSTITUTIONS. If they are systemically racist given it’s on you. It’s YOUR system Progressives!

Mike Sylwester म्हणाले...

The courageous liberals are struggling against racism !

They deserve our admiration !!

They are heroes !!!

I Have Misplaced My Pants म्हणाले...

Your last paragraph in particular: YES. Made me cry.

You are a treasure. Thank you for your work.

Bryan Townsend म्हणाले...

Thanks, Ann, for criticizing the usual hidden agency problem! Paintings don't "insist." This is a frequent rhetorical trick that always needs to be uncovered because it hides the real agency: that of the shadowy figures that are always trying to manipulate us. Art, good art, really isn't about manipulation, it is about widening your world, about going to some new place, or it is about seeing an old place from a new perspective. It needn't be "transgressive," in fact, after so much of that crap, I am suspicious of the very notion.

Fernandinande म्हणाले...

I gather that these cautious, worried people realize that Guston, nee Goldstein, was a Jew who did not like the KKK...?

One of my grandfathers was killed by the KKK when his hood slipped and he wrecked his car on the way to a meeting.

M म्हणाले...

Archeology and anthropology museums‘ exhibits have been all about social justice and “western civilization is the devil” for the last ten years and most have been controlled by people who hate western civ for decades. It is a joke that museums have not been at the forefront of pushing these ideas.

Expat(ish) म्हणाले...

I really like modern art, even the bad stuff can make me smile.

I can put up with the politics around it, at least in small doses.

-XC

PS- One of my favorite museums in the world is the Perez in Miami, which specializes in Afro Caribbean and LatAm art. A *lot* of that is focused on the politics and repercussions of the anti/fascist movements of the 60's-80's. The politics of that are very alien to 'merican eyes. I wonder how many modern leftists learn anything from it? I know I have.

m stone म्हणाले...

Art critic Jason's surname is missing an "r".

Farrago is a confused mixture; hodgepodge; medley: a farrago of doubts, fears, hopes, and wishes.

Yes, truly incoherent writing.

(A favorite word of Daphne Du Maurier, btw.)

m

I Have Misplaced My Pants म्हणाले...

our art institutions cannot afford anything less than a united front against racism and anti-Semitism

Also, fuck this. Art exists to explore the human condition, not to enforce morality. These pompous assholes are excruciatingly stupid and myopic. Who is always first to sneer at those in the church in the middle ages insisting that the only legitimate purpose of art is to battle the devil and all his lies? This is the same thing and these idiots are too ignorant and self-important to see that.

wendybar म्हणाले...

The more I read about the lefts delusion with White Supremacy, the more I pray for our country. This is a sad way to end America.

AlbertAnonymous म्हणाले...

Honestly Professor, I don’t know why you do this to yourself....

It’s the New York Fucking Times.

The Height of Haughty-ness.

Absolute Garbage!

MD Greene म्हणाले...

There is no human institution "that can do justice to the work of all artists and the experiences of all publics." There never will be.


We're at a point when theoretically serious people pretend that each person is entitled to his -- oops, their -- own truth. What's left is potshots from the sidelines to cancel anyone who might put a foot wrong, according to somebody else. To speak is to invite cancellation, the secular equivalent of being condemned to hell.

Who needs museums or music (Beethoven, ick) or art or philosophy? All the products of humanity are flawed. Best to burn them all down.

I feel therefore I am.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves म्हणाले...

All of history is misinterpreted at every turn now. Everything and everyone is pulverized thru the stifling progressive woke-mob virtue signal sieve.

You are all irredeemable racists, first and last. Irredeemable sexists... irredeemable this and that... you don't measure up and you must be cancelled.

No human can survive the progressive woke mob. even a whiff of ... the smallest speck of controversy or challenge - the progressive woke mob is judge and jury and you are condemned to the dust-bin. Cancelled. But somehow you're the intolerant one. Got that?

btw- want to learn about Paul Gauguin's life I suggest Waldemar Januszczak.

Waldemar busts thru a shit ton of misconception about Paul's life. But obviously, Poor Paul Gauguin doesn't stand a chance with the modern progressive woke mob. He must be cancelled. The woke-mob knows he is guilty! of being... human... and partaking in a life filled with activities outside of the progressive woke-mob's stifling puritan hypocritical rules.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves म्हणाले...

If you're going to remove artists from museums because they are controversial and they don't measure up to modern progressive woke-mob virtues - you are going to have a lot of empty walls.

Perhaps Antifa could get into the art business. They are a protected group. We can fill our museums with Antifa-thug-rage art. For the glory of the state.

Marty म्हणाले...

Unfortunately, postmodernism's rejection of logic and reason inevitably leads to incoherent, self-contradicting, pointless babble that neither enlightens nor inspires. Substituting emotion for reason is likely to backfire in tragic ways, as Danton and Robespierre found out several centuries ago. History repeating itself first as farce then as tragedy--where's the art that reminds us of this timeless truth?

ron म्हणाले...

Farago’s attack on Trump illustrates the real problem with the current national discourse. Rather than forthrightly addressing what Trump actually said, he ignores the fact that Trump said he would condemn white supremacy (as he has multiple times, including at Charlottesville). Farrago also called Proud Boys a white supremacist organization. I don’t know much about them, but
they seem to have prominent minority members, so I strongly doubt they are. Also Trump has been clear that he doesn’t know who they are, but wants them to stand down and let law enforcement handle it.

As I have learned from many arguments with friends and family, there is no way to respond to this kind of fact free adherence to a narrative. I am old enough to remember when an argument required acknowledgement of the basic facts on the other side. Otherwise it is just a shouting match.

Mike (MJB Wolf) म्हणाले...

Ack. My first post contained several “lives” that shoulda been “lives” because autocorrect is racist.

SensibleCitizen म्हणाले...

Oprah told her mostly white middle class, middle aged female audiences to be grateful for their blessings and to live their best life everyday. What a simple and beautiful personal manifesto for living a purposeful life.

She tells poor black women that the system is rigged against them. That manifesto will keep them poor and in the ghetto.

Is there systemic racism? Apparently. Oprah built an empire with her own system of racism.

roesch/voltaire म्हणाले...

I have seen many of Guston's paintings, one of my favorite contemporary artists, including the ones which depict ironic visual comments on the KKK and to hold these back from public viewing makes not sense. This strikes me as un-woke.

I'm Not Sure म्हणाले...

"If you're going to remove artists from museums because they are controversial and they don't measure up to modern progressive woke-mob virtues - you are going to have a lot of empty walls."

I hear some towns have pretty plywood murals on public display. Perhaps that will suffice?

CWJ म्हणाले...

"I feel therefore I am."

That really sums up the transformation of western civilisation, doesn't it.

Ampersand म्हणाले...

I recall that, as I embarked upon my post law school job search, a friend of mine insisted that jobs were for losers. What he wanted was not a mere job. He wanted a position.
Too many people have institutional positions, and the whole strategy of having a position is defending that position, like those Japanese soldiers in the jungle who missed the news that the war was over. The reasons for the institutions have changed, or disappeared, but the position-holders gonna do what position-holders do. We need sunset laws for institutions. Break up Harvard, Yale, the Ford Foundation, and a host of the other powerful entities whose money insulates them from common sense.

This is a good idea that will never succeed in being accomplished, short of general social collapse. Sad.

chuck म्हणाले...

Can you guess?

And yes I say yes I can Yes.

TreeJoe म्हणाले...

I'm now openly seeing "anti-racist", "equity" people making the following public statements:

1. White people are the problem.

2. White men are the problem.

3. Police are the problem.

etc.

In other words, large swaths of the population are now claiming entire groups of people are "the problem."

These people aren't being educated about prejudice, racism, and equality. They are being brainwashed to tear down a group of people because of their identity group - in this case the color of their skin or gender.

That sort of blind hatred and blame leads to problems. If history is any guide.

Not Sure म्हणाले...

Of course art museums are manifestations of white supremacy. Just look at their walls--supremely white.

You know what else is white supremacist? Bird watching. That's why Amy Cooper freaked out when Christian Cooper claimed to be a bird watcher. She realized he couldn't really be Black, so she concluded that he must be a Proud Boy in blackface. No wonder she called the cops--those guys are dangerous! Being woke, she knew that the fascist cops wouldn't help her if she said she was being threatened by a PB, so she told them he was black--but she didn't mean Black.

SensibleCitizen म्हणाले...

Oprah told her mostly white middle class female audiences to be grateful for their blessings and to be their best self every day -- a simple path to a beautiful life.

She tells poor black women that the system is rigged against them so accept remaining poor and in the ghetto.

And let's celebrate Planned Parenthood clinics and the right to choose to annihilate the next generation of blacks. And let's not investigate homicides and drug crimes as long as the victims are black. And let's celebrate the right to live on the street in squalor if you're black and homeless.

I've realized this year that the only systemic racism in the USA is in the Democratic Party and it has resided there since the party's inception.

Birkel म्हणाले...

The crocodile will eat them in whatever order it pleases the cricdile.
Sorry, Leftist Collectivists.
You will be first against the wall.

Former Twitter CEO:
https://mobile.twitter.com/dickc/status/1311472075903647750?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1311472075903647750%7Ctwgr%5Eshare_3&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fnewspunch.com%2Fformer-twitter-ceo-calls-for-political-enemies-to-be-lined-up-against-the-wall-and-shot%2F

I plan to fire back.

tommyesq म्हणाले...

"Guston’s paintings insist that justice has never yet been achieved." Paintings insist.

Putting aside the hidden agency problems, at most the paintings "insist" that justice had not been achieved as of some time prior to Guston's death in 1980 and say nothing of what might have transpired since then.

tommyesq म्हणाले...

"Guston’s paintings insist that justice has never yet been achieved." Paintings insist.

Putting aside the hidden agency problems, at most the paintings "insist" that justice had not been achieved as of some time prior to Guston's death in 1980 and say nothing of what might have transpired since then.

Temujin म्हणाले...

Are we going to now have to walk into museums and view the art world equivalent to a Toni Morrison fictional novel? In the world of letters, it seems now that Morrison is to be esteemed above the Classics, which is laughable. Not that Morrison isn't a fine writer, but...I don't consider her high or even memorable art. (not like Baldwin, Hughes, or even Achebe).

With paintings, and with art in general it's always trickier than with letters. At least it used to be. Start telling artists what they have to paint and you'll see the revolution hit a speed bump. I don't think artists like being told what to paint. Museum directors might be another case, however.

In any matter, if the author of the NY Times article wants to see real anti-Semitism in action, he could take a simple 20 minute cab ride up to Columbia University, where they are having a grand old time showing theirs. It's not hyperbolic. It's real. And it's in his backyard.

tommyesq म्हणाले...

...to hold these back from public viewing makes not sense. This strikes me as un-woke.

It strikes me as un-woke but perfectly in line with "woke."

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves म्हणाले...

the tech oligarchs want you dead.

Jupiter म्हणाले...

If "white supremacy" means these stupid assholes being in charge, I'm becoming a multiculturalist.

CWJ म्हणाले...

I think we get these incoherent if not contradictory word salads because the subjects of the text don't exist outside the authors' minds. There's no agreement as to what white supremacy, white privilege, and systemic racism are other than a conviction that they exist, and can be used as cudgels on unfavored individuals and groups. Even an established concept such as racism as used today would be unrecognizable against the actual racism of Althouse's and my youth.

Since there's no objective external evidential standard against which these concepts may be judged, there's equally nothing holding these texts together. Any and everything can be written as long as it can be interpreted by the correct people as high minded and moral.

Birkel म्हणाले...

BB&H:
Then I will want the same for them.
Now we are even.

mikee म्हणाले...

Justice and equity? When someone starts talking about such a great leveling of a stratified society, after the 19th & 20th Century, it should be clear that the lowly poor will not be lifted up to be equal with the mighty, but that the poor will be joined by the formerly mighty. And only the select few will be judges of the justice, and dispensers of the equity. This is a power grab, with unearned grifting added on. To hell with their demands.

gerry म्हणाले...

Did Farago study in Moscow or Berlin?

wildswan म्हणाले...

Harry Shapiro was chair of the Department of Anthropology at the American Museum of Natural History from 1942 to 1970 and during this most of this same period he was a member and a high officer of the American Eugenics Society. Board of Directors 1947-1952, President (1955-1962), Member 1974. The American Museum of Natural History was dominated by Henry Fairfield Osborn and his wealth from 1908 to 1933 and various proteges held important posts thereafter. It is accepted that Osborn was a racist who held the central racist view that races are fixed groups fixed in a hierarchy and the members of the black community were at the bottom of the hierarchy. Hence segregation was right. The AMNH has, of course, reconsidered Osborn and the more obvious signs of his influence and that of his close friend and fellow Madison Grant. But the way in which evolution is taught in America traces back to Osborn and consequently it tends to teach evolution in a way that tends to support racism. There are constant commenters on this very blog who constantly make this point - that evolution as presently taught leads one up to the edge of racism and then suddenly ethical ideas cause a swerve away from the "science. Darwin himself was a racist as shown in The Descent of Man where he ranked the African race as the human race closest to the apes. But evolution need not be racist. But the change needs to be science-led, regardless of the mistakes science made in the past. The AMNH should review its own history as part of this science-led uprooting of a racist form of teaching the theory of evolution. Up to this point the evangelicals and the communists have attacked it on ethical grounds and this leaves the citadel of the racist version of the theory of evolution untouched.

My point in relation to the topic is that science cannot be changed except from within in terms of its own principles freely followed. And the same is true of art or anything else. Naturally the rigid left wants to co-opt the power of science and art because they want to run everything but to the extent that it take them over and rules them by ethical imperatives it kills them off. The universities are not better than they were ten years ago - their leaders now think in jargon that jargon is good. BLM has not produced one song or poem or picture, only graffiti of surpassing ugliness and scenes of brutal violence which are recorded by wandering reporters and denied by BLM. Even sports must be free. Football and other major sports are less interesting and declining in attendance year over year to the exact extent they are perceived as covert ethical lectures rather than sports.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves म्हणाले...

Tree Joe & Birkel -

Exactly. Nazi Germany had similar origins. An entire group of people so vilified- they were carted to the ovens by the millions. ...for the common good. so-called... Justice.


why we must showcase the Tech Oligarchs and the things they say:
You see- you're all a part of the problem -- Unless you conform. The progressive woke-mob want you dead. The Tech Oligarchs who provide Joe with weird eye-reading technology - want you dead and they are brave soldiers who say so openly.

dick costolo
@dickc
· 14h
Me-first capitalists who think you can separate society from business are going to be the first people lined up against the wall and shot in the revolution. I'll happily provide video commentary.

Who is Dick Costolo? - he used to be the CEO of Twitter.

gilbar म्हणाले...

i totally see where they're coming from with this!
Just last week, i went to the National Corvette Museum, in Bowling Green Kentucky; and not only didn't they dwell on the systematic RACISM of two seater sports cars....
They didn't EVEN spend much time demonstrating how light rail is the ONLY acceptable form of transportation

Come, ON! National Corvette Museum!! You know as well as i; that the ONLY reason people come to your museum, is to be lectured about systemic racism and mass transit
LET'S GET WITH THE PROGRAM!!!!

Fernandinande म्हणाले...

Teh google [“problematic” artists like Paul Gauguin] ->

"Artist Michelle Hartney’s Performance/Call to Action (2018) subverted displays of artists such as Balthus, Paul Gauguin and Pablo Picasso, by applying her own series of wall plaques across the galleries to ..." explain why she thinks they were jerks.

With any luck, once the "woke" fad is over and another fad takes its place, other people will be explaining why they think artist Michelle Hartney was a jerk.

n.n म्हणाले...

Woke and drowsy. Diversity (i.e. color judgment) and exclusion.

re: reproductive rites

Unlike one-child, which is the Choice of a single/central/minority committee, selective-child was normalized in order to share/shift responsibility to an individual woman. Clever. Self-moderation is an enlightened cause, not suitable for the likes of women.

when theoretically serious people pretend that each person is entitled to his -- oops, their -- own truth

The right to define reality, a universe unto themselves for social progress, social justice, and other purposes. A Twilight faith. A Pro-Choice, selective, opportunistic, politically congruent ("=") quasi-religion ("ethics"). A progressive liberal (i.e. monotonically divergent) ideology perceived as tolerant.

Owen म्हणाले...

A good friend of mine long ago described this kind of involuted pseudo-intellectual verbal agony as "mental masturbation." How true he was.

Best part of it all, it's self-canceling. If you want to destroy your little institution, if you want to cancel the members of your little tribe ---go ahead. Be our guest. You will have broken contact with the rest of the human race and can continue your descent into oblivion. The rest of us will get along just fine. Right after we clean up the mess you left.

gspencer म्हणाले...

The elite do not want to govern.

They want to rule.

Kate म्हणाले...

How much of art critique is determining how many people will be offended? What's the sweet spot number on that? Piss Christ offended perfectly. Apparently this piece sits too far on the bell end.

tim maguire म्हणाले...

can you guess?
Trump!


Yes! I did guess! What do I win?

The letter writers are dreaming. Of course this will blow over. Religious revivals always do. Museums that hide away controversial works are betraying the future as well as telling audiences to pass them by. They are not worth visiting.

"Really, a museum unequipped to exhibit Guston is barely a museum at all, or else only a museum in the most derogatory sense: a dusty storehouse of dead things."

Farago got that part right.

Fernandinande म्हणाले...

Henry Fairfield Osborn and his wealth

Osborn "described and named Ornitholestes in 1903, Tyrannosaurus rex and Albertosaurus in 1905, Pentaceratops in 1923, and Velociraptor in 1924." Wiki.

How much money should Spielberg owe to Osborn's estate?

Osborn "equated [the] struggle for evolutionary advancement with the striving for spiritual salvation, thereby combining his biological and spiritual viewpoints."

Perhaps he was an "early modern" military man. Spiritary. Militual.

rhhardin म्हणाले...

Their audience is intelligent but also includes women, who have their own sort of intelligence in operation, the kind they're comfortable with.

Cheryl म्हणाले...

I sincerely thought, based on the title of the post, that we were going to read about the incoherent behavior of university presidents in the time of COVID. How many other institutions do those words apply to? I'm not sure you've ever written a more universally applicable title.

And, with regard to this article, OF COURSE it always comes down to Orange Man Bad. Of course. All roads lead to Trump.

Fernandinande म्हणाले...

Corvette RACISM

Does that mean what I think it should mean?

Tommy Duncan म्हणाले...

How about we just allow the public audience to view, discuss and judge the works on display? It used to be OK to gasp at the subject matter.

Must we always have absolutist direction from our betters in deciding what is appropriate art, history or speech for us?

Museum boards, hate crime laws and cancellation now define the very narrow limits of free speech. The Overton window is being bricked shut.

Marshall Rose म्हणाले...

Lack of faith in the intelligence of their audience is at the root of much of the bias in the media. They don't want people to be well informed of multiple perspectives lest we come to wrongthink conclusions.

Dr Weevil म्हणाले...

Has anyone considered that these art museums may be motivated far more by fear than by social justice? African activists have been arrested in Paris and Nijmegen (that's in the Netherlands) for stealing African art from museums. They may are probably right that the stuff was stolen from Africa in the first place, but whether we can trust them to return it is another question. American activists have defaced numerous works of art that are outside where they can get at them, including destroying a beautiful Dilophosaurus in front of the dinosaur museum in Kenosha and 'convincing' the American Museum of Natural History in NYC to remove the monumental statue of Teddy Roosevelt out front. These museum directors are obviously terrified that mobs of Antifas and BLMs will force their way into their museums and start smashing statues and spray-painting or torching Rembrandts and Vermeers as well as Gustons. Of course, sucking up to them and trashing Trump will only make this more likely, especially if Democrat DAs continue releasing looters without bail to loot again.

Dr Weevil म्हणाले...

On a different topic, 'farrago' is an even better word if you know the etymology. Far is Latin for spelt or zea, which is the ancient version of wheat: ours ('common wheat') is slightly different, and scientists argue whether they are different enough to count as subspecies. Latin farrago is "mixed fodder for cattle, mash", made from far. It became a literary term when Juvenal used it metaphorically in his first satire to describe his satires. Roman satire was originally a mishmash of whatever the writer had on his mind, not necessarily criticizing anyone or anything. 'Satire' is related to 'saturate' and comes from 'satura lanx', "full platter", which was the ancient equivalent of a smorgasbord or potluck or dim sum or . . . I used to know a couple of other ethnic versions. 'Satire' was not originally related to Greek 'satyrs' but Romans soon began to pun on the two words.

Dr Weevil म्हणाले...
ही टिप्पणी लेखकाना हलविली आहे.
n.n म्हणाले...

"But the people who run our great institutions do not want trouble. They fear controversy. They lack faith in the intelligence of their audience."

Diversity and exclusion. Political congruence. Judicial legislation. Avoidance for social progress. Protecting the identity of criminal actors in Boy Scouts. Social justice movements founded on false premises. There is a distinct and progressive denial of individual dignity, denial of individual conscience, an indulgence of lowered expectations and condescension.

Michael S. Kochin म्हणाले...

Museums are where art goes when it is dead.
If you want to see living art, go to galleries, visit studios, see art as displayed where people live and work.
If you want to view the embalmed corpses of what art used to be go to a museum.

Martin म्हणाले...

Good art is dying, we will soon be left with only approved agitprop (Stalinist=good, Nazi=bad) posters and melodramas and tunes. If we are lucky some old "real" art will be saved in archival storage... no longer exhibited or available to the general public which won't be much interested, anywaybut preserved for future analysisi or a better day.

But art that elevates or leads to inquiry or deepens understanding or is (merely) beautiful without being moralistic or propaganda---fuhgedaboudit.

PM म्हणाले...

(I don't mind a wild-eyed museum curator, if fact, I insist on it.)

Our public, cultural and educational institutions are early payers of reparations in the form of shows, acknowledgements and participation-by-threat.

At some point, and for many not soon enough, the country will tire of being told who and what matters, and things will settle down.

Rosalyn C. म्हणाले...

As you pointed out the BLM activists in Madison stupidly tore down a monument to a man who gave his life fighting against racism and slavery. Elsewhere across our country BLM activists tore down monuments to abolitionists, Benjamin Franklin, Jefferson, etc. because they represent "white supremacism." Who stopped them? Trump. He wrote an executive order mandating a 10 year prison sentence for destoying public monuments. Of course he gets no credit for that.

So yes, the wise trustees of museums, who are tasked with preserving the best of what mankind has created in the visual arts, should be conservative and careful in dealing with destructive mobs. No one thinks that perfect justice and equity will be achieved in four years, if ever, but things will probably be less volatile and there will not be a real threat of looting and destruction and physical violence. And yes, museums do represent our culture and many other cultures which are guilty of systemic racism. Do we want to see videos of museums being firebombed and looted? And defunded and closed down? The art establishment is working overtime to represent artists who are not white but it takes time.

The Library of Congress preserves a lot of things from our history as well. I went to their website to find something offensive and for instance there is a collection of photographs of Confederate Soldiers. Should we destroy them all because some people now believe they were evil and anything connected to the Confederacy appears to honor the institution of slavery and must be destroyed?

Joe Smith म्हणाले...

Liberal are stupid and weak beyond words. Maybe you should be issued a therapy camel before you view the exhibit.

Or just follow the liberal orthodoxy and burn all museums to the ground. Most of them were paid for and built by old, rich, white racists anyway.

mikee म्हणाले...

Let us find the modern version of "Caedite eos. Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius."
Find the version for art, for academics, for sports, for government, for communists and anarchists and republicans and monarchists and socialists. Then apply it.

mikee म्हणाले...

Are the contents of The National Museum of African American History and Culture in DC a product of white supremacy, and should the place be denounced and vilified? If not, why not?

Rhonda म्हणाले...

I would like to think if we can survive Piss Jesus, we should be fine with this, right? No clue where PJ (also my initials ironically) was shown but that was my first thought.....

John henry म्हणाले...

The paintings were a little odd, because this artist was a primitive, unable to paint or to draw, and hailed as a genius by people who ought to have known better. Purple houses that might have been drawn by a five-year-old child straggled drunkenly across vermilion streets that led to nowhere and meant nothing; men with green faces struggled mysteriously and perhaps discreditably with ladies who had square blue breasts.

"That's a nice one ..." said Jack thoughtfully.

Jane said, "Let's get out of here. People must be mad if they like things like that."

Out in the street he said, "There's another gallery in Bourke Street, up by William Street or somewhere."

Jane said, "I want a cup of tea."


Trying to buy art in Melbourne Australia CA 1950

From The Far Country by Nevil Shute

Rhonda म्हणाले...

I would like to think if we can survive Piss Jesus, we should be fine with this, right? No clue where PJ (also my initials ironically) was shown but that was my first thought.....

philipns म्हणाले...

Re: "What if high art and museums ARE white supremacy?" That is exactly the case that has been being made for some time now, and is now actively being put into practice through "decolonization", etc. The faculty where I teach are at this present moment mobilizing to put exactly this into effect at the school's museum. And in discussing projected financial shortfalls due to COVID, selling off just one painting by a "dead, white artist" to alleviate same was discussed somewhat seriously. Who knows what it really means, but you can see the attempts over the last few years at some of the nation's key museums, and yes, it strikes at the very heart of what it has meant to be such a museum.

Richard Dolan म्हणाले...

Some years ago, the Brooklyn Museum was embroiled in a controversy about various pieces deemed demeaning to Christians (Christ Piss etc.). The wailing about censorship, the insistence on presenting the pieces regardless of the discomfort they caused to many, was deafening. Fast forward to the flap over Guston, where all of that high minded tut-tutting of the deplorables is now inoperative. It turns out, all that really matters is which crowd is taking offense at the artwork.

Stephen St. Onge म्हणाले...

        Yes, I was able to guess what the last paragraph was.  It was the first thing that leapt into my mind.  It had to be there, the story being in the NYT.

        I sometimes wonder what would happen if an MSM outlet were forbidden to write about Trump for a week. Nothing about him or his administration, not even indirectly.  I suspect psychotic breaks would occur.