Is the Met afraid of Mohammed?
The Metropolitan Museum of Art quietly pulled images of the Prophet Mohammed from its Islamic collection and may not include them in a renovated exhibition area slated to open in 2011, The Post has learned.
The museum said the controversial images -- objected to by conservative Muslims who say their religion forbids images of their holy founder -- were "under review."
Critics say the Met has a history of dodging criticism and likely wants to escape the kind of outcry that Danish cartoons of Mohammed caused in 2006.
"This is typical of the Met -- trying to avoid any controversy," said a source with inside knowledge of the museum.
The Met currently has about 60 items from its 60,000-piece Islamic collection on temporary display in a corner of its vast second-floor Great Hall while larger galleries are renovated. But its three ancient renderings of Mohammed are not among them.
"We have a very small space at the moment in which to display the whole sweep of Islamic art," said spokeswoman Egle Zygas. "They didn't fit the theme of the current installation."
This is probably a toss-up of the insane politically correct need to never offend Islam, and the desire not to have some crazy Islamist rush into the gallery shooting, self-detonating, or attempting to hack up people with an axe over a mere image, as I posted on recently.
35 comments:
Chuck, let's try again. The Winston Salem art league (a very productive organization by the way) held a competition. Now as I said, the awards were supplied in part by major corporations, foundations and the NEA. From a variety of sources in other words.
Now, the NEA does very little funding of individual artists. That is rare. Now if you are interested in the topic of arts funding in America I can suggest a reading list. It is clear that you know nothing about the topic.
Now I note in the article from the redoubtable New York Post that it mentions Michael Gross' book as an example of similar instances at the Met, when in fact the book is nothing but a Kitty Kelly type tell all about the fortunes that fund the museum.
It also gets into high dudgeon about renaming the department "Arts of Africa, Oceania and the Americas" rather than "Primitive". The new name seems more accurate to me.
But we still don't know why the works in question were removed and in fact we don't know what they were. A responsible paper might have interviewed the curator in charge.
What's it matter, none of you are going to develop an interest in Persian miniatures, Arab calligraphy or Mughal portraiture any time soon.
Ducky, you need to run for Congress, you have their accounting system done really well.
This is the same horseshit that Congress tries when they tell us they are cutting funding when they increase it a lower rate.
If an organization is funded (fully or partially) by the NEA and they then fund an artist, the artist is funded by NEA money.
Or maybe you can work for the United Way. They claim that the money you donate doesn't go to fund abortions, they use "different money" for that.
AOW: I would have liked to see that.
Dora: Beauty or darkness in art is one thing.
Pissing in a jar is another. But hey, if that's what you're into...
You just like to argue. It's that simple.
This idea of art and beauty became passe about 150 years ago...
..."The beauty of the ugly"
No. It was the observation of subtle differences between feelings of the beautiful and the sublime that began to be explored long before Baudelaire.
Standards of "Beauty" have not become... passe. The collective temporal accents merely move around and flicker like firelight as they chase the assembled prevailing "fashion" favored by "public opinion" at any particular point in time.
After all, not all "goods" can live together at once, there's a tragic element involved in "choice" that creates an illusion of temporal impermanence.
As Einstein remarked, "The only reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen at once."
But Beauty in the absolute cannot be apprehended by sense in the absence of at least one contrasting "imperfection". Therefore a standard of Beauty Absolute can only be apprehended in "Mind".
Now, an extremely small sampling of the collection is on exhibit during the expansion.
I wonder if AOW and the mothers of her students would like to display their curatorial knowledge and discuss what other works may have been removed from display, what the theme of the exhibit is and whether the works will be returned to exhibition status after the renovation or at a later date.
Why do you feel that a single story from a tabloid qualifies you to jump to a conclusion on a field of art in which you have absolutely no knowledge?
This is not uncommon during a museum expansion. Boston is expanding right now and much of the collection is in storage. In the reduced exhibition space for Impressionism related works they took down all the pointillists and left mediocre work by Matisee to please Rollo. They also took down Lautrec in favor of Renoir's treacle. It's just a fact of life during rebuilding.
If an organization is funded (fully or partially) by the NEA and they then fund an artist, the artist is funded by NEA money.
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No Chuck, in this case the exhibit would have continued without the NEA. There was sufficient corporate sponsorship.
In fact I guarantee you have no more idea than a squash what the NEA supports.
Well Farmer, in the case of Serrano's photo there probably wouldn't have been any controversy if it had been "Untitled".
The image itself is appealing. Remove the title and you marvel that an inexpensive plastic crucifix could look that ethereal.
Ducky,
in this case the exhibit would have continued without the NEA
Simple questions seem to work best for you. Was there funding from the NEA for this exhiit? Yes or no?
These links are some that say yes
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piss_Christ
http://www.albionmonitor.com/9804a/nea.html
http://www.csulb.edu/~jvancamp/361_r7.html
Also, as I have stated above, it is all an accounting gimmick. The institution gets money every year from various sources. They then spend that money on projects. It's all the same pot of money.
Bwaaahaaahaaaa!!!! Oh, Margaret!
It's pee, ducky, with a light shown through it.
Part of my job is handling labs at the hospital. I see it in all colors, ect.
There's nothing ethereal about it, no matter what you dip in it.
And does it really take a curator to wonder at removing out of an entire collection the three artworks that depict Mohammad from an Islamic collection?
It would be like a collection of Christian artworks depicting anyone in the Bible BUT Jesus.
Hilariously illogical.
Did the Brooklyn Museum have any credibility with folks like you to begin with? They have lost nothing with people who wouldn't be going to the Brooklyn Museum anyway.
After his wife divorced him, Joe asked his best friend, Bill, to fix him up with a blind date. Bill obliged. The next day Joe called up Bill and shouted at him angrily: "Bill, what kind of a guy do you think I am. That girl you fixed me up with was cross-eyed; she was almost bald; her nose was long, thin and crooked; she had hair growing on her face; she was flat chested; and her ankles were as thick as her thighs".
Bill answered: "Either you like Picasso, or you don't like Picasso."
And does it really take a curator to wonder at removing out of an entire collection the three artworks that depict Mohammad from an Islamic collection?
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Let's review for Brooke. The galleries at the Met are undergoing renovation and currently fewer than 100 works from one of the largest Islamic art collections in the world are being displayed.
Clearly there are going to be curatorial decisions and we have no idea what they were.
You don't know what prompted the decision or even if it's permanent. Are those works going to be displayed in the renovated gallery? Are the works significant in some way? Unusually high quality (Hint: NO)?
What we have here is a single article from a muckraking tabloid that may or may not have some germ of truth but the far right bloggers are willing to jump in even though this is a subject area where they are demonstrably uninformed.
Chuck, the idea that there is government sponsorship in the arts is not an issue. There is.
The issue is that you have no idea what it funds or how the funding mechanism works.
This is demonstrated by the utter ignorance over the Serrano issue.
Brooke, have you ever seen the image?
Can you begin to comment on what lens filters he used an why? In other words it is a far cry from your lab samples.
Let's speak slowly for Ducky.
Do you think that at least one of only three works the Met is in possession of which contain the image of Mohammad would be relevant to an Islamic art collection?
Sheesh.
And yes, I have seen the Serrano image. Perhaps the intricacies of human waste amaze you, but to me it's urine in a cup.
Pee is pee, no matter how you shoot it. It didn't take the talent of Rembrandt to whiz in a jar.
When a leftist lacks talent but still wants to be avant-garde, you get a Serrano.
Next you'll be telling me that it took a lot of talent for Schwarzkogler to wrap his buddy in gauze and pretend to hack his penis off.
Ducky, the only CATHOLIC who thinks a cross in urine looks 'ethereal'..Are you NUTS?
And, CHuck's right about NEA FUNDING..spin as you will, you're just plain wrong, Ducky....
Brooke, good point; what talent does it take to pee?
Brooke, the Duck evidently hasn't seen enough pee, it still holds a fascination for him. I have seen men so drunk they can't stand be able to pee in a jug, not very well mind you but they could do it. So peeing in a cup is not very talented IMHO. I would even suggest that they could, given an object like a small crucifix, proceed to put it in the cup. It may take them several attempts but they would get there.
As far as the funding Duck, I actually could care less how the arts are funded, this was never my point. My point is that crap like piss christ are funded by the NEA and liberal pinheads like you defend that funding.
This statement by you goes right to the heart of how I feel about arts funding
There was sufficient corporate sponsorship.
Let the arts be funded by private sponsorship. I do not care to have my tax dollars spent on the arts. The same for sports arenas, rodeos, car races, or whatever other venue you are about to accuse an ignorant redneck like me of supporting.
This is one of the reasons we are in the economic mess we are in, irresponsible government funding.
This does tie together some of the discussion here regarding the possible reasons for the removal of the works by the Met (we still don't know for certain why it was done).
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From WIKI
During a retrospective of Serrano's work at the National Gallery of Victoria in 1997, the then Catholic Archbishop of Melbourne, George Pell, sought an injunction from the Supreme Court of Victoria to restrain the National Gallery of Victoria from publicly displaying Piss Christ, which was not granted. Some days later, one patron attempted to remove the work from the gallery wall, and two teenagers later attacked it with a hammer.[5] The director of the NGV cancelled the show, allegedly out of concern for a Rembrandt exhibition that was also on display at the time.
imagin that tring to prevent pee from getting on a Rembrandt.
Logic is dead for some, I see.
Thank you, Z, Chuck, EB!
Ducky would pay to see someone take a shit on stage and smear their own turds on themselves and call it "performance art."
take a virtual tour of the MOMA sometime....it's very interesting what SOME people consider art.
it does take some talent to pee AND aim
Beamihs...dukkky and plating go together
Ducky, I advise you to step out of this discussion about what is art with these connoisseurs. Pee can never be a component of any artistic work, it's that simple, don't you get it? There, the question of what is art is solved, it's that simple /s
mr. ducky,
The image itself is appealing... ONLY IF you Remove the title (from Mind) and then... you marvel that an inexpensive plastic crucifix could look that ethereal.
But since the "artist" CHOSE to label his work as he did, we can only "assume" that the artist did not merely intend the viewer to "admire" the work in this "naive" manner, but instead chose to require his audience to "contemplate" the contrast and relationship between the "sacred" (good) and the "profane" (bad) depicted and make a judgement as to the wrok's merits/demerits on that basis. And of course, when one takes into account the totality of Seranno's oevre, any "completely innocent" intellectual rationalizations as to the artist's "deliberate intention" with regards to this individual artistic piece becomes highly suspect.
...and Dora, your strawmen are quite ridiculous. No one is saying that piss can never be a component used in the production of art, we are simply stating the obvious, that it is unlikely to be considered to be a quality of "good art" if it's presence is in any way called attention to and made obvious.
Contrast Seranno's use of urine with Michaelangelos.
I prefer the use of piss in this piece of art
One could hardly accuse you of aspiring to the higher motive of "artistic freedom" attributed to Seranno by his defenders, elbro. But in all "fairness", I will. ;-)
consider it avant garde FJ
I'm curious they haven't asked the Tate to remove the William Blake drawing of Muhammad tearing his chest open from Dante.
There are also Islamic works in the Uffizi which are using techniques in advance of the school of Siena which picture Muhammad.
Still like to know why a reputable arts publication like The Art Newspaper hasn't picked this up. Probably a non story.
Now Beamish and Elmo can returning to giggling because they had a chance to say poopy and pee-pee.
And Ducky can go back to staring with wide wonder at it.
But Brooke,
Serrano's got the nicest picture of piss I ever did see.
Brooke, why are you fixated on Serrano? The issue is images of Muhammed.
Are you familiar with the William Blake water color in the Tate? It is a far less "flattering" image than anything involved at the Met.
And there are 14th century Islamic works that anticipate sme of the style of the critical early Renaissance in Sienna.
Haven't heard any calls to remove them. So we still don't know why the Met removed them. Was it a response to an objection? Well that has happened in the past as far back as the 40's in America so it's possible.
It's a pity that art can't be discussed with far right wingers. Especially contemporary work.
You keep bringing it up, Ducky. FJ was simply trying to make a simple point on the double standard in play regarding Islam.
Here was the line from the post:
"The museum said the controversial images -- objected to by conservative Muslims who say their religion forbids images of their holy founder -- were "under review."
Critics say the Met has a history of dodging criticism and likely wants to escape the kind of outcry that Danish cartoons of Mohammed caused in 2006."
You know, it really is a pity that leftists think they hold the market on art and its review. It's really hard to have a dialogue with someone who is foolishly looking down their nose.
What double standard? I am simply pointing out that the image of Mohammed in art history is more complex than you imagine and we still have no reporting on just why the images were removed and if that removal will continue beyond the period of renovation.
You reviewed nothing. You gave no depth to the story,
duhkkky it's not the art per se it's the indoctrinating nature in which it's discussed I thought we've been over this....
so much of modern art is produced in my opinion by a bunch of lazy *ss people who haven't got past using crayons and wouldn't know how to use something as complex as a compass
there's no virtuosity in it...attach some esoteric meaning to it and voila
it's a religion duhkkky with the MOMA as its temple
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