Of crucifixes and WikiLeaks

Untitled (Christ), 1998
David Wojnarowicz
black and white photograph, 27.5" x 36"

I read Blake Gopnik's Washington Post article about the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery's removal of late artist David Wojnarowicz's video installation piece. The objection raised by the Catholic League and other conservative groups, centers around an 11-second segment in the video where ants crawl on a crucifix. The League stated this segment was, “designed to insult and inflict injury and assault the sensibilities of Christians.” The artist hoped the passage would speak to the suffering of his dead lover and to do so, in Gopnik’s words:

[In] the great tradition of using images of Christ to speak about the suffering of all mankind. There is a long, respectable history of showing hideously grisly images of Jesus - 17th-century sculptures in the National Gallery's recent show of Spanish sacred art could not have been more gory or distressing - and Wojnarowicz's video is nothing more than a relatively tepid reworking of that imagery, in modern terms.

Again we hear the argument that taxpayer-funded museums should be held to some "standard of decency," ostensibly to be determined by a religious, conservative minority. It is little more than fear hiding behind self-righteous indignation, and bigotry supplanting love in the name of God. Not content with merely having the piece pulled from the NPG, the Catholic League has sent a letter to the House and Senate Appropriations Committee, challenging them to "reconsider the proprietary funding of the Smithsonian institution." Effectively, thier prescriptive morality censors not only the artist and the NPG, but it censors the rest of us as well.

The recent WikiLeaks drama is a contentious issue in our post-9/11 culture, and one I see as important to any discussion of censorship. Some argue (with justification) that diplomacy will be compromised, and that lives will be endangered. But this is largely a distraction from the main issue, the content and implications of that information. Regardless of how one may feel about these leaks, the action of releasing the information into the public arena is accomplishing exactly what it was intended to do, to spark public debate; and that is a good thing. We are questioning our approaches, we are confronting and being confronted by our allies, and citizens –not just policymakers, are part of this discourse. The media is for the moment doing its job to inform and raise questions about our government’s actions and policies.

One of the fundamental tenets of democracy is that we are supposed to have divergence of opinion, but more importantly we are supposed to work through those disagreements in a public, civilized and transparent manner. In order to do this, there must be a certain degree of autonomy to ideas, or in this case, to art. Both of these incidents are about an attempt to centralize power and control information in the name of the public good. By this logic, the Inquisition and the Iconoclasms were equally justified. It is not up to the select few to determine what is "good" for the rest of us; not in politics, not in art, not in life or lifestyle.

It’s provincial to suggest that the National Portrait Gallery should not mount controversial exhibitions for fear of offending even the smallest segment of the public, -or worse, simply because it is publicly-funded. One must remember that art is provocative in its time, and what we consider commonplace today (like women artists) was at one point unimaginable and deeply offensive to society. Museums are indeed about education, and part of that education in this case is to expand what the public thinks of as a portrait. We should discuss what we see on the walls (this, I would argue is the point of going to a museum), and those discussions by all means should sometimes be heated and contentious if we ultimately embrace the right to a difference of informed opinion. Such discussions cannot exist however, if the opportunity -despite the risks, is never presented.

The extremes in our society don't want to allow for anyone else’s preferences. If groups like this have their way, what will we be allowed to see in our museums? Isn’t this is the same argument used against nudes in art throughout history?

My taxes also fund the NPG. I want to see this "vile" piece re-installed and I want to see some backbone from our public institutions and our elected representatives in the face of this cultural bullying. We falsely cast bullying as a problem with youth, but we deny the source from where they are learning it; adults. As Gopnik so succinctly states, if you don’t like an exhibit you can always vote with your feet. What you cannot do, is tell everyone that they don't get to see it simply because it offends you.

One important function of art is to hold things up to the light of day and to offer us an opportunity to think about those things differently. Art is a language through which we can express ideas that otherwise are too difficult, uncomfortable, personal, offensive, abstract, or even beautiful to otherwise address through our daily vernacular. The real issue with this piece is that it talks candidly and personally about AIDS, and some people don't want to have that discussion.

Do the Catholic League and other conservative groups ever go directly to the artist in these cases? One would think they might see it as an opportunity to educate that person, or less-aggressively see it as an opportunity for honest discourse through which both parties might learn about one another. I would hazard a guess that they don’t. They claim to be bold, but they are cowards who fear any dissent to their obviously fragile ideology. One can’t help to wonder if the prophet they claim to follow would have sat down with Wojnarowicz and discussed his work. I’m no theologian, but I like to think so.

Yes, when one deals with iconography and symbol –especially religious symbol, one must be both conscious and deliberate. Yet it is wrong to take any and all use, re-purposing or co-opting of symbol as a direct affront to one’s personal beliefs. Art challenges us to explore context, after all. One cannot do this by isolating that which they find objectionable and responding solely to that without acknowledging the entirety of the piece.

Taking offense is a personal choice. It essentially gives someone else power over you, and that is why I am very difficult to offend. We have become so careful in our society that we jerk any and all controversial art from a public venue the moment a few individuals or a loud group complain. What's worse, this is done in secrecy until after the fact. Let's have some public hearings before these institutions cave to these extremists.

To the NPG, shame on you. Your press release makes you appear weak and pathetic, and what hope do we have if our public art institutions will not stand up for themselves and defend their curatorial choices? Such should be their charge.