If Mort Divine ruled the world

[CiG]

If anything, this is an attempt by a museum to extend intellectual discussion beyond the boundaries of the university. Good for them.

By removing the art itself and asking people to give their opinions on its removal, all they're really doing is gauging public support for censoring a piece that is deemed sexist by today's contemporary feminist standards (as part of a larger plan to remove the fleshy female body section of the gallery lol).

So actually it's censorship and cowardice, why can't they foster a discussion while the piece remains hanging? They even removed all postcards from the gallery's store that featured the art in question.

The article also says that this project (censorship) is related to and in some way a reaction to the #MeToo movement (or whatever one would call it) and I have trouble separating the removal of the piece from the hysterical culture surrounding #MeToo-esque things. A kind of bourgeois paternalism which implies that depicting women as passive decorative art or a femme fatale will somehow impact the mental health of women as a collective; nonsense.

What next, censor Henrietta R. Rae's paintings as a way to foster discussion on internalized misogyny? The art community are so up their own ass it isn't even funny anymore.

 

[Einherjar86]

So actually it's censorship and cowardice, why can't they foster a discussion while the piece remains hanging?

Because actually removing it inspires precisely the kind of frustration that you're showing. Without the passion, where's the impetus for discussion?

I could just as easily argue that it's cowardice to raise such questions while leaving the painting up. If they really wanted to make a point, they'd take it down.

Ultimately, this is a disagreement over what the museum is there for. You think it's there to provide uninhibited exposure. I think it's there to mediate exposure. In other words, the museum participates in the artistic process.

 

[CiG]

Because actually removing it inspires precisely the kind of frustration that you're showing. Without the passion, where's the impetus for discussion?

My frustration is with censorship, regardless of what art is taken down, so it doesn't really foster discussion of art, not really. Take an example of something I would stereotypically hate like say, a modern feminist artist who created a piece that was just "kill all men" written in fake period blood or something stupid, that should not be taken down in order to foster discussion about male/female relations or something, it should be kept up and used as the centerpiece for the topic.

Censoring something to create discussion is a hilariously Orwellian concept. What's next, give a criminal the electric chair to foster discussion about the death penalty?

I could just as easily argue that it's cowardice to raise such questions while leaving the painting up. If they really wanted to make a point, they'd take it down.

Well no because then they have to contend with the perception that they're questioning underlying potentially sexist themes whilst endorsing them by leaving it up. The pearl-clutching activists literally make the exact same point in regards to no-platforming.

It's not enough to let a speaker speak and be challenged, they need to be censored in order to a) avoid being seen as endorsing the speaker's views but also b) foster discussion around the speaker without actually challenging the speaker head on.

Ultimately, this is a disagreement over what the museum is there for. You think it's there to provide uninhibited exposure. I think it's there to mediate exposure. In other words, the museum participates in the artistic process.

I fundamentally disagree with your (and their) conflation of censorship with the artistic process so the point doesn't really carry with me tbh. Manchester Art Gallery is publicly owned and funded to boot.

 

[Einherjar86]

My frustration is with censorship, regardless of what art is taken down, so it doesn't really foster discussion of art, not really. Take an example of something I would stereotypically hate like say, a modern feminist artist who created a piece that was just "kill all men" written in fake period blood or something stupid, that should not be taken down in order to foster discussion about male/female relations or something, it should be kept up and used as the centerpiece for the topic.

It does create a discussion of art though. You just have a restricted definition of "art."

Censoring something to create discussion is a hilariously Orwellian concept. What's next, give a criminal the electric chair to foster discussion about the death penalty?

That's a terrible misuse of "Orwellian." In Orwell's nightmare, you can't mention The Theory and Practice of Olgarchical Collectivism at all...

Well no because then they have to contend with the perception that they're questioning underlying potentially sexist themes whilst endorsing them by leaving it up. The pearl-clutching activists literally make the exact same point in regards to no-platforming.

You assume that it would be more controversial for them to leave it up while raising this question, and yet you and numerous others are raising your fists because they've taken it down... So I would contend that they've taken a risk in removing it.

 

[CiG]

It does create a discussion of art though. You just have a restricted definition of "art."

The posted stickies left in the piece's empty space in the gallery (as well as general online reaction) just proves my point that, by censoring the piece they have morphed the entire discussion which was intended to be about art and underlying potentially sexist themes contained in pieces like the one removed into a discussion of censorship.

They've made it almost impossible for people who take great interest in the issues of gender representation to react in any way other than to defend the principle of anti-censorship. It's a stupid mess of the type only fart-sniffing Twitterati types could create in the pursuit of some pseudo-intellectual goal.

That's a terrible misuse of "Orwellian."

No it's not. Censoring art to create discussion (and therein redefining censorship as a form of progress) is exactly the kind of double-speak nonsense Orwell warned society about. It's simply a smaller scale version of when governments call warfare "peace-keeping efforts."

You assume that it would be more controversial for them to leave it up while raising this question, and yet you and numerous others are raising your fists because they've taken it down... So I would contend that they've taken a risk in removing it.

All actions have risk, that's irrelevant to what I've said so far. Either action is controversial to some people, what would be the most controversial while on balance beneficial would be to leave it up and forge a discussion series around the art, putting it directly into the spotlight rather than removing the piece from the spotlight and then asking people to tell them how they feel about what isn't in the spotlight anymore.

 

[Einherjar86]

The posted stickies left in the piece's empty space in the gallery (as well as general online reaction) just proves my point that, by censoring the piece they have morphed the entire discussion which was intended to be about art and underlying potentially sexist themes contained in pieces like the one removed into a discussion of censorship.

They've made it almost impossible for people who take great interest in the issues of gender representation to react in any way other than to defend the principle of anti-censorship. It's a stupid mess of the type only fart-sniffing Twitterati types could create in the pursuit of some pseudo-intellectual goal.

It hasn't proved your point. It's demonstrated that people are different and react in different ways. Some turn the discussion into a reflection on censorship. Some acknowledge the discrepancy between gender relations today and those in the past.

No it's not. Censoring art to create discussion (and therein redefining censorship as a form of progress) is exactly the kind of double-speak nonsense Orwell warned society about. It's simply a smaller scale version of when governments call warfare "peace-keeping efforts."

I don't think you're correct because they've emphasized, more than once, that the purpose isn't to censor; and in today's information-free society, it can hardly be argued to be censorship. You can Google the image if you want to so badly. Orwell didn't live in the age of ubiquitous information that we do. You're equating two entirely different contextual situations.

William Gibson writes:

Orwell's projections come from the era of information broadcasting, and are not applicable to our own. Had Orwell been able to equip Big Brother with all the tools of artificial intelligence, he would still have been writing from an older paradigm, and the result could never have described our situation today, nor suggested where we might be heading.

This is, in my opinion, a crucial position on Orwell's political relevance.

All actions have risk, that's irrelevant to what I've said so far. Either action is controversial to some people, what would be the most controversial while on balance beneficial would be to leave it up and forge a discussion series around the art, putting it directly into the spotlight rather than removing the piece from the spotlight and then asking people to tell them how they feel about what isn't in the spotlight anymore.

You're assuming that it would be more controversial to leave it up. Based on the responses they've gotten, I think you're wrong.

 

[CiG]

It hasn't proved your point. It's demonstrated that people are different and react in different ways. Some turn the discussion into a reflection on censorship. Some acknowledge the discrepancy between gender relations today and those in the past.

Seems to me from looking around that actually it is most vs. the rest rather than some vs. some.

I don't think you're correct because they've emphasized, more than once, that the purpose isn't to censor; and in today's information-free society, it can hardly be argued to be censorship. You can Google the image if you want to so badly. Orwell didn't live in the information age that we do. You're equating two entirely different contextual situations.

As I said, censors never self-identify as a censor. An easily dismissed point you've made tbh.

Furthermore my point about censorship doesn't need Orwell's context and in some ways you and Gibson are correct; Orwell's context is outdated and in many ways this is why the American left often sneer at people who bring up Orwell, because your entire concept of censorship is not based on principle but rather law, legality, the bill of rights; the first amendment.

It allows people to say "I'm a first amendment absolutist" while simultaneously siding with non-state censorship. Non-Americans tend to argue against censorship more strongly because they (we, I) don't have a first amendment to fall back on when we don't feel like being principled. In that way I think Americans (especially on the "left" now) are some of the very worst defenders of freedom of speech, expression and in general anti-censorship.

However my only point regarding Orwell was in how "censorship to foster discussion" was an internally contradictory form of double-speak and so in that sense I don't need to live in a context that Orwell relates to because I'm only drawing parallels with speech now which resembles Party talk.

You're assume that it would be more controversial to leave it up. That's the assumption you're making. Based on the responses they've gotten, I think you're wrong.

No, I'm suggesting that we would have gotten controversy and on balance a beneficial discussion about something we as a society don't perhaps talk about enough. It has simply turned into a discussion on censorship; something which we basically know what society thinks.

Though I'm happy to have it obviously, any excuse to kick a censor about is fine by me.

 

[CiG]

Manchester Art Gallery: We have left a temporary space in Gallery 10 in place of Hylas and the Nymphs by JW Waterhouse to prompt conversation about how we display and interpret artworks in Manchester’s public collection.



"left a temporary space" - sheer cloudy vagueness? Check
"to prompt conversation" - question-begging? Check.
"how we display and interpret artworks" - euphemism for the act of censorship? Check.



Perhaps my personal favourite part of their statement is this: We have left a temporary space in Gallery 10 in place of.

I've been working in the building industry for a decade and I've never heard the act of tearing down and removing a building as leaving a temporary space where the building used to be lmao. No you removed the building.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

No dude you just don't get it, read Derrida and Foucault

The sheer statement and discussion is overwhelming my every sense

 

[CiG]

I hope Deron removes that post so we can forge a discussion about it.

Those genuinely interested in the work as a piece of art will be drawn to the discussion. Those interested in it purely for its craftsmanship and as a piece of visual stimulation can search for it on Google.

This is also exactly why some on the left have created the term 'corporatist-progressive' because here you have Ein saying that if people are really bothered by an art gallery which is publicly funded censoring a piece of art they can just Google it.

Right, let's all lay our fundamental freedoms of speech and expression of which all other freedoms follow in the hands of multinational corporations. Great idea, great defense of freedom. Never mind that it also alienates anybody who is too poor to even afford an Internet connection, let alone one that is powerful enough to load a painting scan of that size and quality, how typical of the neo-aristocracy.

There really needs to be a new word for people like that (corp-prog isn't catchy enough tbh) because that isn't left-wing in any sense I understand.

 

[Einherjar86]

I'm trying to figure out the best way to address your points because your perspective is so drastically different than mine.

Furthermore my point about censorship doesn't need Orwell's context and in some ways you and Gibson are correct; Orwell's context is outdated and in many ways this is why the American left often sneer at people who bring up Orwell, because your entire concept of censorship is not based on principle but rather law, legality, the bill of rights; the first amendment.

I have an issue with this because censorship historically refers to the suppression and prohibition of works--not to their perpetual discussion in the absence of a museum exhibition (which, in case you didn't realize, is always temporary; museums exchange works, they sell them, they loan them, etc.).

This isn't censorship in any sense of the word, since the very topic of discussion is the exhibition of this work in a museum setting. The concern isn't to suppress the work or prohibit people from seeing it; it's to ask what are the politics of exhibition.

Part of me thinks I'm simply of a different opinion than you are. I see this as an active and engaged intervention into aesthetic discourse and the display of artworks in a public setting. It's not asking people to flush the painting down the memory hole, as it were (to invoke Orwell), but to perpetually recall the piece, and to consider it.

So once again, it's not censorship in any sense of the word, even in principle.

However my only point regarding Orwell was in how "censorship to foster discussion" was an internally contradictory form of double-speak and so in that sense I don't need to live in a context that Orwell relates to because I'm only drawing parallels with speech now which resembles Party talk.

They didn't use the word "censorship." That's your word. Do you see how that's a disingenuous on your part? You're imposing the word censorship and then saying "that's doublespeak!"

This is also exactly why some on the left have created the term 'corporatist-progressive' because here you have Ein saying that if people are really bothered by an art gallery which is publicly funded censoring a piece of art they can just Google it.

That's not what I'm saying at all. I'm saying that the image itself is still widely available. It hasn't been hunted down and snuffed out, sites that display it haven't been shut down, it isn't prohibited for anyone to own a print of it. I'm sorry if you think I'm being a "corporatist-progressive," but I'm just not compelled at all by how you're defining "censorship."

The original artwork carries nothing more than a signature of creation, which is what people go to a museum to see. None of its content or subject matter is being suppressed. The museum is evincing an interest in its role as a mediator and curator of what we deem to be of aesthetic value and how we display it. I do not see any censorship in this act.

 

[CiG]

I have an issue with this because censorship historically refers to the suppression and prohibition of works--not to their perpetual discussion in the absence of a museum exhibition (which, in case you didn't realize, is always temporary; museums exchange works, they sell them, they loan them, etc.).

You keep trying to make the point that museums put up and take down new pieces all the time as if I'm saying the piece in question should be displayed for eternity, which is clearly not what I'm saying but rather the manner in which they removed just one piece (as well as removed the postcards with the piece on it) is not standard practice or part of some managerial process of refreshing the display walls with new stuff.

You're being completely disingenuous with that line of argument imo.

This isn't censorship in any sense of the word, since the very topic of discussion is the exhibition of this work in a museum setting. The concern isn't to suppress the work or prohibit people from seeing it; it's to ask what are the politics of exhibition.

While at the same time not allowing those who are being urged to comment on exhibition to even be able to see the art.

They didn't use the word "censorship." That's your word. Do you see how that's a disingenuous on your part? You're imposing the word censorship and then saying "that's doublespeak!"

Removing a piece of potentially offensive art is censorship, I simply circumvented the euphemism in this case. Of course I'm not saying that they think what they're doing is censorship, though it should be of note that they immediately made sure people knew they weren't censoring anything so in a sense they did use that term in so much as they didn't want it to be applied to their actions.

We'll just have to agree to disagree here.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship

Somebody better not-censor that not-censored image used to display an example of censorship.

 

[Dak]

The US isn't engaged in war in the Middle East. It's merely engaging in kinetic operations to foster discussion about geopolitics in the region.

 

[Einherjar86]

We'll just have to agree to disagree here.

You don't wanna go a few more rounds?

I think you're right though, my position prevents me from uncritically viewing this as censorship.

I do take HBB's point though, there are valences to prohibitive behavior that might be called censorship without being entirely suppressive. I still hesitate to classify what Manchester did as censorship though, if only because they're asking people to actively consider the very content they're supposedly censoring. At most I'd say it's ambiguous territory and not easily identifiable as censorship.

In other words, removing the painting altogether has overtones of censorship, but the museum's intervention in the vacancy itself, and its attention to the content being "censored," complicates the matter. In other words, they're not simply removing the painting and saying they find it "in poor taste" or "offensive," or slapping black tape over nipples and vaginas, but asking audiences to reflect on the image. I understand that the image isn't actually there, but the museum isn't just brushing it aside or unequivocally blanking out parts of it, which is what would happen in a more straightforward censorship scenario.

 

[CiG]

You don't wanna go a few more rounds?

I mean, sure.

I still hesitate to classify what Manchester did as censorship though, if only because they're asking people to actively consider the very content they're supposedly censoring.

I understand that the image isn't actually there, but the museum isn't just brushing it aside or unequivocally blanking out parts of it, which is what would happen in a more straightforward censorship scenario.

At most I'd say it's ambiguous territory and not easily identifiable as censorship.

How can they consider it if they cannot see it? Yes, they can Google the piece but surely the museum don't expect people to do so when they could just keep it on the wall and form the discussion around something directly in people's faces.

I've not said this is straightforward censorship either btw, just so we're clear. I've said this is a very cowardly indirect attempt to gauge the public's reaction to offensive art being removed from its walls. I think they're playing a censorious game, pressured by recent scandals related to women and men, but lets give them the benefit of doubt for a minute and suppose this is all just an art project, I also think they've done it in such a hamfisted way that they've ruined any chance this project will ever be about anything other than censorship and setting a dangerous precedent etc.

It actually doesn't make much sense even. To foster discussion by removing a piece that nobody who is expected to engage in the discussion can any longer see and we also shouldn't forget the context in which the project was conceptualized:

The work usually hangs in a room titled In Pursuit of Beauty, which contains late 19th century paintings showing lots of female flesh.

Gannaway said the title was a bad one, as it was male artists pursuing women’s bodies, and paintings that presented the female body as a passive decorative art form or a femme fatale.

“For me personally, there is a sense of embarrassment that we haven’t dealt with it sooner. Our attention has been elsewhere ... we’ve collectively forgotten to look at this space and think about it properly. We want to do something about it now because we have forgotten about it for so long.”

 

[Dak]

Gannaway said the title was a bad one, as it was male artists pursuing women’s bodies, and paintings that presented the female body as a passive decorative art form or a femme fatale.

They should just complete the squaring of the circle and hang a printout of this:

 

[Einherjar86]

It actually doesn't make much sense even. To foster discussion by removing a piece that nobody who is expected to engage in the discussion can any longer see and we also shouldn't forget the context in which the project was conceptualized

I was being sarcastic about the "few more rounds" thing, I also think we'll just agree to disagree.

I would, however, be willing to agree that it might not be the most effective method for stimulating discussion about the topic they want to discuss (if only because the act itself is too distracting). I just don't think that it adds up, ultimately, to censorship.

 

[CiG]

I'll be keeping an eye on this regardless to see how it ends.

 

[Dak]

CNN in full damage control about the memo still. "Democrats say important info left out, big nothing burger". Ironically, even if everyone important was informed of the details of the origin of the intel or was ignorant of the funding source, the bottom line is best case the DNC corrupted justice in pursuit of an election they still didn't win - and went broke doing so.