Hatred as art

The exhibition “Sensation” opened last week at the Brooklyn Museum of Art. Among the 90 works are the preserved corpse of a pig cut in half, a bust of a man made from his own frozen blood, a statue of naked pubescent girls with erect penises for noses, and a portrait of the Virgin Mary covered with pictures of genitalia from pornographic magazines and stained with a clump of elephant dung. When this exhibition first opened in 1997 at London’s Royal Academy of Art, it caused an uproar beyond the art world, with Britain’s Daily Mail nicknaming the venerable institution the Royal Academy of Porn.

New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani has threatened to cancel $7 million in city funding of the museum, arguing “You don’t have a right to a government subsidy for desecrating somebody else’s religion.” In response, the museum is suing the city and Guiliani for violating the First Amendment. However, the Supreme Court has ruled that governments can determine how public money on cultural and artistic events is spent. Most recently, in a case involving the National Endowment for the Arts, the Supreme Court approved a federal “decency test” for arts funding. Still, lawyers for both sides are developing positions and another cultural disagreement is headed to court.

Certainly, the right to free expression in any form is at the core of our collective American soul. But that right is not absolute. There is no attempt here to keep the artists from creating whatever bizarre or perverse object they wish, the objection lies in the public funding of material that a segment of the public finds hurtful and offensive to deeply held values and beliefs.

In the current politically correct environment, in which every odd and singular attitude and philosophy is to be accepted, it is profoundly sad and inexplicable that some in the art world continue to embrace hate speech toward religion — specifically, Christianity. It is, in that self-indulgent quarter, the last acceptible prejudice. If the picture of the Virgin Mary covered in genitalia and elephant dung was changed to a picture of Chief Seattle or Rosa Parks or Mohammed, it certainly would not be shown. And no one advocates for a government subsidy to the Klu Klux Klan in order to protect their hate speech. But then, they are not artists.

Art can shock, upset and even disorient its viewers. Picasso and his contemporaries upset the art world with their striking vision, but the artistic talent and craftsmanship are unmistakable. Where is the art in chopping a pig in half? Or in smearing animal feces on a cherished icon of one of the world’s great religions? “The Jerry Springer Show” causes strong emotional reaction; it is also grossly manipulative, cruel, and stupid. And it accomplishes all that without benefit of a government grant.

Public financial support of an exhibition that does injury to our neighbors’ deepest held beliefs is a form of psychic warfare. If those beliefs are hateful, such as racism, they deserve to be confronted. Belief in the sanctity of the Virgin Mary is not hateful and is sacred to our Catholic friends. Spiritual people everywhere need to speak out against this kind of violence disguised as artistic expression. If not, what you hold sacred may be next.