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Shredding the Girl and Balloon - The Director’s half cut

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Banksy publishes video detailing auction stunt plan

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Schooltv: Censuur tijdens het communisme - Kunstenaars onder druk

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In Rusland heb je in 1917 een revolutie waarin stapsgewijs de communisten de macht grijpen. Dus de communistische partij van Lenin en later Stalin. Bij de verankering van de communistische Revolutie in de Russische samenleving hebben kunstenaars een belangrijke rol gespeeld. Deels omdat ze mee wilden helpen, deels omdat ze gedwongen werden.

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Schooltv: ARTclips - Waarom maken mensen zich kwaad over kunst?

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Maurice Lede bezoekt musea in Amsterdam, Rotterdam en Tilburg waar mensen die alles van kunst weten hem helpen de antwoorden te vinden. In deze aflevering zoekt hij uit waarom mensen zich kwaad maken over kunst.

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Met alleen de hashtag #revolutie kom je er niet

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In haar gepassioneerde essay Ik kom in opstand, dus wij zijn. Nieuw licht op verzet onderzoekt Eva Rovers recente Twitter-revoltes. Voor een échte revolutie blijkt meer nodig dan een hashtag, betoogt ze.

Een kleine handleiding voor het verzet, die zou nog van pas kunnen komen. Dezer dagen moet je op alles voorbereid zijn. Eva Rovers toont met haar essay Ik kom in opstand, dus wij zijn. Nieuw licht op verzet dat zij snakt naar een geslaagde revolte. Na schuinsmarcheerder Boudewijn Büch, wiens biografie zij schreef, onderzoekt zij in dit essay de regelrechte weigeraar, de opstandeling, degene die 'hartstochtelijk leven' verkiest boven een fysieke of 'mentale zelfmoord'. Het...

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Met alleen de hashtag #revolutie kom je er niet

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In haar gepassioneerde essay Ik kom in opstand, dus wij zijn. Nieuw licht op verzet onderzoekt Eva Rovers recente Twitter-revoltes. Voor een échte revolutie blijkt meer nodig dan een hashtag, betoogt ze. Een kleine handleiding voor het verzet, die zou nog van pas kunnen komen. Dezer dagen moet je op alles voorbereid zijn.

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Met samenvatting van het essay van Eva Rovers - PDF

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Met samenvatting van het essay van Eva Rovers - PDF

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Met samenvatting van het essay van Eva Rovers Kunstgeschiedenis Docente: Karin de Jonge Studente: Suzette Roza Inhoudsopgave - Samenvatting essay Eva Rovers blz. 3 - Kröller- Müller essay blz. 4 - Bronvermelding

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Tegen de vertrutting van de kunst - Cultuur - DVHN.nl

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Harma Heikens, bekend geworden met beelden die verwarrende en ongemakkelijke gevoelens oproepen, stopt met het maken van kunst. Tijdens het Nederlands Film Festival in Utrecht legde ze deze week uit waarom.

Schimmig zaaltje

Het is een schimmig zaaltje waar we zijn beland. 'We' dat zijn de bezoekers van het clandestien college van Brandend Kalf, een initiatief dat onderzoekt hoe de Nederlandse film scherper, kritischer en beter kan worden. ,,Want nu beperkt film in Nederland zich tot overzichtelijke huis-tuin-en-keukenproblematiek", stelt journalist en medeorganisator Karin Wolfs. ,,De wereld van de Nederlandse films is gekuist van klimaatproblemen, immigratievraagstukken, eurocrisis, de oprukkende controlestaat en populisme. Met de overdreven aandacht voor louter particulier drama hypochondert de Nederlandse film zich ziek."

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Harma Heikens, bekend geworden met beelden die verwarrende en ongemakkelijke gevoelens oproepen, stopt met het maken van kunst. Tijdens het Nederlands Film Festival in Utrecht legde ze deze week uit waarom. Schimmig zaaltje Het is een schimmig zaaltje waar we zijn beland.

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door Joep van Ruiten, Dagblad v/h Noorden, 23 september 2017

Harma Heikens, bekend geworden met beelden die verwarrende en ongemakkelijke gevoelens oproepen, stopt met het maken van kunst. Tijdens het Nederlands Film Festival in Utrecht legde ze deze week uit waarom.

Het is een schimmig zaaltje waar we zijn beland. 'We', dat zijn de bezoekers van het clandestien college van Brandend Kalf, een initiatief dat onderzoekt hoe de Nederlandse film scherper, kritischer en beter kan worden. ,,Want nu beperkt film in Nederland zich tot overzichtelijke huis-tuin-en-keukenproblematiek", stelt journalist en medeorganisator Karin Wolfs. ,,De wereld van de Nederlandse films is gekuist van klimaatproblemen, immigratievraagstukken, eurocrisis, de oprukkende controlestaat en populisme. Met de overdreven aandacht voor louter particulier drama hypochondert de Nederlandse film zich ziek."

Om in ieder geval filmmakers en filmstudenten op andere ideeën te brengen is voor het college een aantal sprekers uitgenodigd.

Zoals de schrijver Anton Dautzenberg, initiatiefnemer van onder meer de Quiet 500, een glossy over stille armoede. Hij heeft een doos meegebracht met weggeefexemplaren van Vuur!, zijn bloemlezing over engagement in de literatuur.

Zoals filosoof Eva Rovers, auteur van het essay Ik kom in opstand, dus wij zijn over de verdovende kracht van ideologiën.

Zoals filmmaker Stijn Bouma, die in Utrecht vertelt over de lessen van subversieve leraren.

Beeldend kunstenaar Harma Heikens verkeert in dit gezelschap omdat ze binnenkort ophoudt met de kunst. Heikens is het zat dat haar popart-achtige beelden die gebruik maken van archetypes, clichés, beeldvorming en propaganda en waarvan ze 'de boodschap zelf ook niet altijd begrijpt' worden misbruikt. Ze constateert 'vertrutting van de kunst met grote K, als gevolg van popularisering en expansiedrift'. Haar aankondiging te stoppen met kunst heeft veel losgemaakt. ,,Ik denk omdat mensen het herkennen", zegt ze.

Eerder op de avond probeerde Heikens samen met Wolfs en de andere sprekers het uitvergrote beeld van het Gouden Kalf op Neude in Utrecht in brand te steken. Alles symbolisch uiteraard. Met een beamer werden vlammen op de blikvanger van het filmfestival geprojecteerd. Aan de meeste omstanders ging de actie voorbij, zelfs de beveiligers van het filmfestival keken er niet van op. ,,Veel verder konden we niet gaan. Als we gearresteerd zouden worden, kon onze avond niet doorgaan", aldus Heikens. In het schimmige zaaltje, een voormalig krakersbolwerk, nu politiek cultureel centrum ACU, gaat het er bevlogen aan toe. Rovers stookt het vuur op met een betoog waarin het consumptisme en het neoliberalisme worden neergezet als dominante ideologieën die 'klaarlicht denken' onmogelijk maken en waarbinnen menselijk handelen een bijproduct is geworden van een obsessieve lifestyle. ,,Kunstenaars zijn degenen die mensen wakker kunnen schudden, horen we Rovers zeggen. ,,Maar het lijkt wel of filmmakers zijn vergeten dat ze kunstenaar zijn. Ze wentelen"zich braaf in de rol van 'cultureel ondernemer'. Ze schrijven filmplannen die passen bij de 'speerpunten' van subsidiënten en omroepen, waarin ze meer nadruk leggen op marktaandeel en kijkcijfers dan op hun eigen visie en het marketingplan het hart van de hele aanvraag lijkt te zijn. Ze doen wat het systeem van ze verwacht, gaan mee in de consensus in plaats daartegen in opstand te komen." Rovers constateert dat kunst letterlijk behapbaar moet zijn om zoveel mogelijk mensen te trekken. ,,Kunst wordt gereduceerd tot aangenaam vermaak, dat zijn bestaansrecht ontleent aan de mate waarin het bijdraagt aan economie. Niet voor niets wordt er nog zelden over kunst gesproken, maar over 'creativiteit'. Een kunstwerk heet een 'cultureel product', kunstenaars worden aangeduid als cultureel ondernemers en de kunstwereld als geheel is slechts relevant als deze zich profileert als creatieve industrie.

Dat is ook wat Harma Heikens heeft gemerkt. Ze vertelt over hoe kunstprofessionals op haar werk reageren en hoe het haar is overkomen dat haar beelden uit tentoonstellingen zijn verwijderd, zoals vorig jaar tijdens festival Noorderzon in Groningen. ,,Wat er dan gebeurt is bekend. Binnen een uur gaat het op sociale media over de aantasting van de vrijheid van expressie. Nog een uur later gaat het over de aantasting van de vrijheid van meningsuiting. Als alle vlaggetjes zijn opgestoken, gaat het niet meer om het werk zelf en wat het uitdrukt en oproept. Wat Heikens steekt, is dat mensen die betaald worden om kunst mogelijk te maken, zich steeds meer om hun eigen positie en steeds minder om de kunst zelf bekommeren.

,,Toen ik 25 jaar geleden begon, was kunst min of meer buiten-maatschappelijk. Nu is het een sector met cijfers geworden. Er zijn honderden mensen afgestroomd van opleidingen Kunst en management en Kunst en toerisme. Iedereen wil iets leuks met kunst doen, maar dan wel zonder de risico's van het kunstenaarschap." Het vreemde is, aldus Heikens, dat het in theorie allemaal goed wordt bedoeld. ,,Er zijn bevlogen ambtenaren. Er zijn goede opleidingen. En iedereen wil zo cutting edge en onconventioneel mogelijk zijn. De hele galeristen-kliek, de hele ambtenaren-kliek. Iedereen weet sinds de jaren zestig en zeventig wat kunst moet zijn. We zijn het allemaal met elkaar eens, maar als het er op aankomt, laten ze je vallen als een baksteen. Ik ben er klaar mee.

Het verhaal van Heikens wordt in het zaaltje herkend door onder anderen filmmaker Jos Stelling. ,,Er is de afgelopen jaren een brei aan managers ontstaan, en die hebben het overgenomen. Bij de bezuinigingen hebben de kunstenaars ingeleverd, maar de managers zijn blijven zitten. Die managers hebben ook het vreselijke woord 'makers' geïntroduceerd. Met kunstenaars kunnen ze niets, want dat zijn anarchisten, die doen niet wat hun wordt gevraagd. Maar makers kun je sturen. Daar is het fout gegaan."

Wat daarna gebeurt, gebeurt vaker tijdens debatten over kunst: de aandacht verschuift naar geld dat door de overheid onder voorwaarden beschikbaar wordt gesteld voor de kunsten en hoe dat vervolgens wordt verdeeld onder de kunstenaars die het geen probleem vinden publieksbereik en politieke doelen hoger te stellen dat het verspreiden van oorspronkeljke ideeën. De onvrede in het zaaltje blijkt groot, niet alleen over de werking van de markt, maar vooral over het functioneren van de fondsen. Er wordt voor alternatieven gepleit. Het woord crowdfunding valt.

Kunstenaars die hun nek durven uit te steken, betalen daar een prijs voor, merkt Anton Dautzenberg op. ,,Toen ik voor een onderzoek lid werd van de pedofielenvereniging Martijn raakte ik al mijn opdrachtgevers kwijt. Maar: toen ik nergens meer een poot aan de grond kreeg, was ik blij met de steun van het Letterenfonds."

Een dag later blikt Heikens tevreden terug op haar bezoek aan Utrecht ,,Ik heb mijn punt gemaakt, zegt ze. Begin volgend jaar volgt haar laatste tentoonstelling in Breda. Daarna gaat ze zich bezig houden met het maken van art-toys, designerspeelgoed in beperkte oplage. Dat moet niet als een capitulatie, maar als een consequentie worden gezien, zegt ze. ,,Ik heb lang gedacht dat de er een harde kern bestaat waarin kunst als vrijhaven functioneert. Ik heb gemerkt dat die kern is veranderd omdat de mensen die in en rond die kern werken zijn veranderd. Ik vind dat jammer, maar het is blijkbaar de tijd."

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tegen de vertrutting van de kunst - Harma Heikens Sculpture

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door Joep van Ruiten, Dagblad v/h Noorden, 23 september 2017 Harma Heikens, bekend geworden met beelden die verwarrende en ongemakkelijke gevoelens oproepen, stopt met het maken van kunst. Tijdens het Nederlands Film Festival in Utrecht legde ze deze week uit waarom. Het is een schimmig zaaltje waar we zijn beland.

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Harma Heikens verlaat de kunst met een grote K. Niet omdat ze te weinig geld krijgt: ze werkt al tien jaar zonder subsidie. Ook niet omdat ze geen succes heeft: haar sculpturen zijn tentoongesteld van Amsterdam tot New York. Evenmin omdat haar een 'Berufsverbot' zou zijn opgelegd, zoals sommigen nu tot haar afgrijzen beweren. Dat klopt niet.

(De tekst gaat verder onder de foto.)

Harma Heikens houdt op omdat ze het vertikt als kunstenaar te worden ingezet in de culture wars van het burgerlijke midden. Zij ziet de kunst vertrutten sinds ook hier 'de gewone man' de dienst uitmaakt. De gewone man die behoefte zou hebben aan 'verbindende idealen' en zich door van alles en nog wat bedreigd voelt. Kunstenaars worden steeds vaker geacht 'dat leed te verzachten met een Groot Verhaal, liefst eentje waarin de Gewone Man zelf figureert'. Knuffelkunst, is dat wel genoemd. 'Dát vind ik pas bedreigend', schreef Harma Heikens, toen ze haar besluit vorige week per e-mail rondstuurde.

De knieval voor de publieke opinie in beroepsgroepen die ooit geacht werden onafhankelijk te denken, begint inderdaad wel een beetje een fenomeen te worden. Als het Rotterdamse Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art onder druk van protesten aankondigt van naam te veranderen in iets dat 'niet kwetst en buitensluit', bijvoorbeeld. Of wanneer dertig 'journalisten en mediaprofessionals' een 'manifest' ondertekenen met de omineuze titel 'Naar een verantwoorde journalistiek'. Nu een 'groeiend aantal Nederlanders zich afkeert van het nieuws', schrijven ze met een nogal misplaatst gevoel voor causaliteit, is een verslaggever pas 'verantwoord' bezig als die meer goed nieuws verspreidt.

Positief doen verkoopt ook beter, dat weet iedere marketeer, maar dit terzijde.

(De tekst gaat verder onder de afbeelding.)

Harma Heikens werkt en woont in een oud schoolgebouw in de Groningse binnenstad. Op haar ezel staat een nieuw, onvoltooid reliëf, van een moslima in niqaab met haar IS-vriendje: 'Kijk, net Bonnie en Clyde', zegt de kunstenaar, die een krantenfoto van het stel laat zien. Maar haar IS-strijder ziet er ook nog uit als het Beest uit Belle en het Beest. En het geheel heeft iets van een Blaxploitation-filmposter. Meerduidigheid die weerstand zal oproepen, dat heeft Harma Heikens genoeg ervaren. 'Tegenwoordig hangen ze er liefst een bordje naast: De kunstenaar bedoelt het goed.'

Twee jaar geleden beschreef ik hier hoe haar beeld 'Toys in the attic', een op een dildo knabbelend soort poezenkind in afgezakt broekje, van het Groningse festival Noorderzon werd verwijderd. Dit omdat twee jongens dreigden de boel in brand te steken. Maar de directie van het festival werd vervolgens boos op nota bene de kunstenaar zelf, omdat zij in de lokale pers haar verbazing uitte. 'Het zou in Nederland nooit mogen voorkomen dat een kunstwerk niet getoond wordt om zijn inhoud', liet haar vaste galerie KochXBos in Amsterdam destijds nog weten.

Maar dit jaar weigerde KochXBos een werk van Heikens te exposeren en ging haar tweede solotentoonstelling daar niet door. Het ging om een sculptuurtje van een brandende Amerikaanse vlag: 'Verbranding van een symbool, dat vonden ze niet kunnen'. Alsof ze echt van plan was vlaggen te verbranden, zegt Harma Heikens. 'Maar het is een sculptuur van een brandende vlag, ook nog in de stijl van een comic book. Dat is iets heel anders.'

Ik bel later galeriehouder Esther Koch, die het verhaal bevestigt: 'Ik herken de vertrutting waar Harma het over heeft. En kunst moet schuren. Maar niet zó.'

Harma Heikens vertelt over haar vroegere galeries. Ben en Harrie Loerakker, 'ouderwetse galeristen', als daar iemand binnenliep en zei dat haar kunst 'niet kon' dan ging Hannie geduldig uitleggen waarom het wél kon. Of Jacob Witzenhausen, die met de armen over elkaar voor zo iemand ging staan en zei: 'Als het je niet bevalt, dan donder je maar op!' Dat burgers nu meer aanstoot aan kunst zouden nemen is een misverstand, zegt Harma Heikens, dat was altijd al zo. 'Er zijn alleen steeds minder mensen die iets durven verdedigen.'

(De tekst gaat verder onder de foto.)

Er kwamen nieuwe bestuurders en technisch directeuren zonder veel benul van kunst, die dat nog trots hun 'frisse blik' noemen ook. Mensen die altijd positief willen zijn en heel bedreven zijn in kunstretoriek en subsidieproza: alles moet cutting edge zijn en 'op het scherpst van de snede' en 'risicovol'. Harma: 'Maar ze willen niet begrijpen dat bij risicovol werk hoort dat je ook risico loopt.' Het moet schuren, maar het mag geen pijn doen.

Harma Heikens wil niet iemand worden die zich steeds moet afvragen of haar werk gedoe zal veroorzaken, want daar was het haar nooit om te doen. Zij wil alleen maar onbevangen blijven.

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Deze kunstenares vertikt het te worden ingezet in de 'culture wars' van het burgerlijke midden

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Harma Heikens verlaat de kunst met een grote K. Niet omdat ze te weinig geld krijgt: ze werkt al tien jaar zonder subsidie. Ook niet omdat ze geen succes heeft: haar sculpturen zijn tentoongesteld van Amsterdam tot New York. Evenmin omdat haar een 'Berufsverbot' zou zijn opgelegd, zoals sommigen nu tot haar afgrijzen beweren.

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Harma Heikens

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Harma Heikens

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Harma Heikens

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Eva Rovers

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Gerard Ekdom richt Bond tegen Vertrutting op - Kunst & Media - PAROOL

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Mogen ouders hun kind niet op de mond kussen? Na kritiek op een foto van Victoria Beckham heeft Radio 2-presentator Gerard Ekdom De Bond Tegen Vertrutting opgericht. 'Het is een keertje genoeg.'

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OIRSCHOT - De expositie 'Mythe. This is my blood' van Ralph Posset is nog niet geopend of het leidt reeds tot verontwaardiging binnen christelijke kringen.
Ralph Posset, een man die als geen ander bekend is met de kunst van het provoceren, exposeert van 1 maart t/m 6 april in Museum Kruysenhuis te Oirschot. 'De taboe doorprikkende kunst van kunstenaar Ralph David Posset schrijnt, zet je voortdurend op het verkeerde been en laat je mild grimlachen. Een lucide flirt met provocatie maar de kunstenaar zal je nooit direct kwetsen', schrijft Mark van de Voort ter inleiding op de website van het museum.

Wat voor werk van Posset te bewonderen zal zijn in het museum, is de grote vraag. De kunstenaar schept er genoegdoening in om daarover in het vage te blijven en te verrassen. Interviews zijn niet echt aan de man besteed. In bepaalde christelijke kringen houden ze hun hart vast, zo meldde het Eindhovens Dagblad afgelopen week. Volgens de regionale krant maakt mogelijk de geruchtmakende Bijbelserie onderdeel uit van de expositie.

Posset kwam begin vorig jaar in het nieuws met een reeks nieuwe kunstvoorwerpen die gerelateerd zijn aan religie. Zoals speciaal voor jehova's, zijn ouders waren volgelingen, vertaalde Bijbel-pagina's in de vorm van een wc-rol. Of een op een Bijbel bevestigde asbak waarmee hij wil aangeven dat in de Tweede Wereldoorlog pagina's uit het heilige geschrift werden gebruikt als vloeipapier voor sigaretten. Het bewuste tv-item van Omroep Brabant bracht nogal wat boze reacties teweeg.

En dat speelt nu weer op. Museum Kruysenhuis zegt mails te ontvangen van verschillende christelijke organisaties waarin gesteld wordt dat men zich beledigd voelt door de Bijbelse kunst van Posset. "Triest dat iemand het nodig heeft om zoiets te doen. Hij weet dat hij zo mensen pijn doet", aldus diaken Broeders van het Bisdom Den Bosch bij Omroep Brabant. Dominee Jan van Drie uit Oss noemt het feit dat de bijbel als wc-papier wordt gebruikt 'schokkend'. "Ik snap de meerwaarde er niet zo goed van."

"Er is wat ophef, ja", laat bestuursvoorzitter Han Smits van Museum Kruysenhuis weten. "Wij hebben elk jaar in de Passietijd een expo met een relatie tot religie. Posset spot niet met geloof, hij gaat er op zijn manier mee om. Juist nu moeten we vrijheid van meningsuiting accepteren." Smits acht de kans dat de expo wordt afgeblazen of aangepast "uitermate gering". Posset zelf heeft naar aanleiding van de ophef aan het Reformatorisch Dagblad gemeld dat hij de expositie 'aanpast', maar op welke wijze...

Ralph Posset haalde tien jaar geleden geregeld het nieuws met het voeren van acties die deden terugdenken aan de Provo-tijd. In 2004 plaatste hij 200 beschilderde dildo's op verschillende plaatsen in zijn woonplaats Den Bosch, een kunstzinnig protest tegen de vertrutting van de maatschappij. Een jaar later plaatste hij 77 wassen neuzen op het Binnenhof in Den Haag, symbool staand voor de leden van het toenmalige kabinet. Voor de Sint Jan kathedraal in Den Bosch schreef hij met duizenden condooms het woord 'Aids Kills', waarmee hij het condoomverbod van de katholieke kerk bekritiseerde.

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OIRSCHOT - De expositie 'Mythe. This is my blood' van Ralph Posset is nog niet geopend of het leidt reeds tot verontwaardiging binnen christelijke kringen. Ralph Posset, een man die als geen ander bekend is met de kunst van het provoceren, exposeert van 1 maart t/m 6 april in Museum Kruysenhuis te Oirschot.

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Saatchi & Saatchi | New Directors' Showcase

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David Freymond | Hold your Horses - 70 Million | Saatchi & Saatchi New Directors' Showcase 2010

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Calvin Harris, Sam Smith - Promises (Official Video)

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Ceci n'est pas un vidéo… 

This is an ode to the figure of the inspectors, a short movie that immerses you inside a surreal dinner. A cinematographic, conceptual and purely aesthetic vision of their job. Structured in five chapters and with the five senses combined as a common thread of the plot, “The Inspector” is a commissioned movie by the Michelin Guide to express its gratitude to them for showing us new worlds year after year.

Taste it!

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Was my father’s leftover stuff the key to who he really was?

Winner of the Vimeo Staff Pick Award at the 2018 Ottawa International Animation Festival.

"Honest, funny, nostalgic and incredibly inventive, the recipient of this prize tells the story of a young man sifting through his late father’s belongings in an attempt to uncover the intimate details of his life. A perfectly arranged menagerie of old film footage, audio recordings, and meticulously crafted stop motion animation, it is a beautiful tribute to a complicated but devoted father-son relationship. We are proud to present the Vimeo Staff Pick Award at the Ottawa International Animation Festival to “My Dead Dad’s Porno Tapes” by Charlie Tyrell." - Vimeo Curation

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Two young men meet on an inner city housing estate, against a backdrop of high rises residential buildings. Are they about to fight or kiss? Crashing Waves explores the tension between both possibilities through expertly choreographed dance in the unlikeliest of settings.


Crashing Waves was commissioned for Random Acts the short film strand by Channel 4.  Showcasing the world's boldest and most innovative creative shorts. Created in collaboration with our Ignition Random Acts Network Centre: Screen South and our production partner The University of Creative Arts. Supported by Channel 4 and The Arts Council. 

Broadcast as part of Channel 4's: Random Acts Season 5.
Selected for the BAFTA recognised Best of British category and nominated for the Iris Prize 2018.
Official selection for BAFTA recognised Aesthetica 2018.
Official selection for GAZE 2018.
Official selection for Outfest 2018.

"Emma does so much with so little in her film: the choreography is brutal, tender and the metaphoric space it occupies is epic. Two young men expressing their love for the first time on the public stage of their council estate. Emma is one to watch."
Zawe Ashton

Screen South Website: http://www.screensouth.org/

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A story about relationship.
Music composed by Gregory Semah.

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Fabric and skin is translated into a digital mesh that acts like a dynamic membrane between body and the surrounding space. Like fashion, it constructs/deconstructs identity and becomes a media that propagates information in form of textures, patterns and shapes. The work visualizes this underlying forces in forms of threads weaving together and tearing apart fragments of cloth and skin.

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A documentary portrait of octogenarian queen of Cornish punk Viva Hamnell, or, how to be a rebel at 82.

A heart-warming portrait of rebellion, spirit and joie-de-vivre.  Britain’s oldest punk, great-grandmother Viva Hamnell reflects on her life in Cornwall’s first punk band, her love of Vivienne Westwood-inspired style and her trial for drug possession.

In this life-affirming short documentary by award winning director Amanda Bluglass, ‘Viva’ demonstrates that even at the age of 82 it is still possible to look fabulous, laugh loud and live well.
  
Producer/Director:  Amanda Bluglass www.amandabluglass.co.uk
Director of Photography and Editor Danny Cooke www.dannycooke.co.uk

Lunafest 2014
Best Shorts FF2014
Aesthetica Short FF 2014
San Francisco Shorts FF 2014

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Paul Bloom, psychologist and Yale professor, argues that empathy is a bad thing—that it makes the world worse. While we've been taught that putting yourself in another's shoes cultivates compassion, it actually blinds you to the long-term consequences of your actions. In this animated interview from The Atlantic, we hear Bloom’s case for why the world needs to ditch empathy.

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A small protest to stop stereotyping and prejudice against people. 
I took around 400 photos, edited the colour and brightness of them all in Photoshop & then spent a full day editing it in Adobe Premiere.

There are a few parts I may change but otherwise I think it gets the message across.

For more information on this campaign visit:
http://standagainststereotypes.tumblr.com

Or for my blog go to:
http://themindofmat.tumblr.com

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"shape without form, shade without colour,
paralysed force, gesture without motion..."

- T.S. Elliot -

“Passion White” strives to achieve austerity, simplification of form and mathematical precision. It is an attempt at finding out if it is possible to create realistic tension in a sterile, minimalistic space resembling a white canvas.  Each frame represents separate micro world, which carries primary, raw emotions.  Unhurried pictures and perverse repetition of sounds are set out to engage the viewer in a specific, dreamy state of hypnosis.

written & directed by: MARTYNA IWAŃSKA
director of photography: JAKUB GIZA
produced by: PIOTR HULL

production manager: MONIKA BUCZYŃSKA
art director: MARTYNA IWAŃSKA
set designer: JANA ŁĄCZYŃSKA, MARTA KOZERA
costume designer: KAROLINA GRUSZECKA
hair designer: ELA PASZKOWSKA, KASIA KORNACKA
make-up artist: GOSIA SULIMA, MONIKA FETELA
music: PAWEŁ LUCEWICZ
edit: MARTYNA IWAŃSKA, KAMIL GABRYSIAK
color correction: DOMINIK DERAS

cast: MARIETA ŻUKOWSKA, ALEKSA MATERSKA, IWO SWIŁŁO, KRZYSZTOF SIERPIŃSKI, ALEKSANDRA LIASHENKO

and: MAGDA PAWELSKA, ALEKSANDRA ŻELAZOWSKA, MILENA STĘPIEŃ, IGA MROZIAK, SMOQ

1 ad: KAROLINA CHAREMSKA
costume design assistant: MARTA HARNER
focus puller: PAWEŁ FIWEK
gaffer: DAREK BARWIEJUK
II gaffer: JAKUB ZAWISTOWSKI, PIOTR REDZISZ
grips: MARIUSZ DRĄŻYK, ROMAN DROZDA
stagehand: ROBER BACZYŃSKI
stuntman: MICHAŁ KRZYŻKOWIAK, KAJETAN GINTER
legal services: EMILIA PIASECKA
camera equipment: FASTMEDIA & EBH
lighting equipment: HELIOGRAF
dolly equipment: GRIPPAKA

poem used in the video: "HOLLOW MEN" - T.S. ELIOT
creations udes in the video: ZOFIA CHYLAK

special thanks to: MAGDA CZMUDA, MARCIN JANIEC, MAJA ADMIAK, AGI JENSEN, TOMASZ LEWANDOWSKI, ADA ROHDE, JAKUB BOCHNIARZ, MARTA WARSZAWSKA

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"The Architect" - A Modern Ballet Film ( Directed by Stephen T Lally )

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“The Architect” - an impressionistic distillation of a modern ballet piece. 

A film directed by Stephen T Lally. Leeds, June 2014. 
Based on a modern ballet from the choreographer Kenneth Tindall.

The show had its long-awaited London debut at The Royal Opera House on the 12th May 2015, and was later chosen for FRAME The London Dance Film Festival and the Byron Bay International Fashion Festival. 

Full credits below…

"THE ARCHITECT"

Choreography & Concept by KENNETH TINDALL  (http://www.kennethtindall.co.uk/)

Film Directed by STEPHEN T LALLY (http://www.stephenlally.com/)
Edited & Produced by SARAH MORGAN

Set & Costume Design by CHRISTOPHER GILES  (http://www.christopher-giles.com/)
Original Music Composed by RICH KEYWORTH  (http://richardkeyworth.com/)

Starring the cast of NORTHERN BALLET  (http://northernballet.com/)
MARTHA LEEBOLT, TOBIAS BATLEY, KEVIN POEUNG, JESSICA MORGAN, HANNAH BATEMAN, DREDA BLOW, GIUILIANO CONTADINI, JOSEPH TAYLOR, NICOLA GARVASI.

Composite Effects by DARYL BEANEY
All Additional Composite Visual Effects by JUNAUM DE LUCA
With Thanks To Post Producer STEVE LOWE & THE VFX CO, LONDON  (http://www.thevfxco.co.uk/)

Colourist SIMON ASTBURY at UNIT, LONDON  (http://unit.tv/reels/simon-baselight)
Behind The Scenes Filming by JAMIE HUGHES at GECKO FILMS  (http://www.geckofilms.co.uk/)

Make-Up by ISSIDORA using COSMETICS à LA CARTE  (http://www.issidora.com/)
Make-Up Assistance by MELANIE GARNIER

Hair by JAZZ using ORIBE
Hair Assistance by MONA MOCK

Lighting Design by ALASTAIR WEST
DoP JC CHEUNG 
Focus Puller LUKAS DEMGENSKI

Wardrobe Supervisor & Costume Maker CARLEY MARSH
Assistant Costume Maker PAULA GROSVENOR
Hair, Make-Up & Tattoo Advisor HELEN RUSSELL

Production Assistance by SAMUEL MORGAN
Custom Printed Fabric by L&S PRINTS DIGITAL LTD

Filmed in June 2014 at SASSY STUDIOS, LONDON 
& at THE STANLEY & AUDREY BURTON THEATRE, LEEDS

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Women (Saoirse Ronan, Cecily Strong, Kate McKinnon, Aidy Bryant, Leslie Jones, Melissa Villaseñor) address the ongoing sexual harassment allegations. #SNL #SNL43 Get more SNL: http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live Full Episodes: http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-liv... Like SNL: https://www.facebook.com/snl Follow SNL: https://twitter.com/nbcsnl SNL Tumblr: http://nbcsnl.tumblr.com/ SNL Instagram: http://instagram.com/nbcsnl SNL Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/nbcsnl/

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Define Beauty: Internet Comments Uncensored

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Director Marie Schuller crystalizes male objectification by merging footage of dancer Remy Fox with the voices of the trolls that litter comments across her social media.

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PAINT SPLATTER

Jackson Pollock from art to fashion

by KOD Staff

Jackson Pollock is back in fashion. This season, the paint splatter was found lurking in the collections of Raf Simons and Hunter Gather. Against a backdrop of trending politics - many designers made racism the theme of AW14 - Simons and Hunter Gather's David Bradshaw turned to the anarchy of abstract expressionism instead. From the catwalk to the pages of Vogue, we trace the influence of Pollock on fashion throughout the years.

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Jackson Pollock from art to fashion by KOD Staff Jackson Pollock is back in fashion. This season, the paint splatter was found lurking in the collections of Raf Simons and Hunter Gather. Against a backdrop of trending politics - many designers made racism the theme of AW14 - Simons and Hunter Gather's David Bradshaw turned to the anarchy of abstract expressionism instead.

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Looking back over her five-decade career, photographer Jo Ann Callis would say nothing much has changed. "My interests have always been the same," she says, speaking from Culver City, Los Angeles where she has lived and worked since 1980. "I'm always trying to find new ways to express the same ideas."

In Now and Then, her second retrospective show at ROSEGALLERY, Callis demonstrates the varied textures and expressions she has given to these interests since 1970 when, as a young mother of two, she enrolled at UCLA and began taking photographs. Her focus is the domestic, psychodramas of the home and human relationships. Avowedly non-political - "it's just not in my nature to be that way" - nonetheless her photographs of women, children, interiors, cream cakes, naked backs and hand-bound ankles prompt the same questions about gender, beauty, power and subjugation that were being asked by feminists on the global stage.

Callis' first solo show took place at the infamous, if shortlived, Woman's Building in downtown LA, and her richly coloured images exploring the violent, the strange and the erotic elements of family life feel riven with rage and gender protest, but Callis rejects this easy interpretation. "All of my work is about me. My stuff, my insecurities. I'm never representing anyone else, ever. I don't know how people do that."

Rather than taking retrospective credit for political sagacity she never felt, at 78 Callis is excited by her images being transformed both by new printing technology and by being seen through new eyes. We asked the photographer about revisiting the past and why no artist should be embarrassed to be emotional.

On feminism and the role it plays in her work...
"I think sometimes you are not aware of how things are affecting you directly. Sometimes you are, and you read something, see something, hear something, and a light goes on and you begin to open up a new thought process. But generally you just absorb what's going on around you, what's part of the culture. Whether you're aware that's what you're doing or not, we all live in the time we're living in and are affected by what's going on around us. But I was too busy to be politically active, it's just not in my nature to be that way, so I didn't make work to be about feminism per se. I was expressing myself - I had just started working in this new medium and I was figuring out how I could say something that was personal to me.

"I had my first show at the Woman's Building, but kind of by accident. An artist friend was scheduled to have a show there, but she wasn't ready so asked if I wanted to take her spot. It all came together at the same time, but it wasn't a conscious decision to make work about feminism. In my mind it wasn't an issue in my work, it was just coming from me and I'm a product of my time."

On emotion in art...
"It's hard to say what time will do. We all have a moment when we're alive and people are interested. But I think people are more accepting of things now, whereas for a period, at least with the people I was with, it was really looked down upon to be emotional, to have the artist's voice come through. Styles come and go, and when conceptuality came in, emotion became abhorrent to people. The art world is more open now, not so dogmatic. We can see there are so many parts of the brain to use, and all of us have feelings as well as theories - art should be big enough to take in everyone's interest."

On looking back...
"I don't think my work has really changed over time. Actually I would say over my lifetime - even since I was a teenager - my interests have always been the same. They have just come out in different ways, found different ways of expressing themselves."

On what other people see...
"I find the things other people bring to my work fascinating. Some of it I recognise, even if it wasn't literally on my mind while I made the photographs. I was home with children so domesticity was my territory. Home, metaphorically and emotionally, it means so much and it always has, growing up as well as an artist. I like exploring the feeling of home, the discomfort and tension that is there, which in turn lays bare a whole gamut of things.

"It never feels like I'm representing anyone else, ever. I don't know how people do that. I'm just trying to find new ways to express the same ideas."

Jo Ann Callis: Now and Then is at ROSEGALLERY in Santa Monica, LA until November 24, 2018.

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Disturbing, Erotic, Domestic: Jo Ann Callis' Photos Capture a Strange World

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Looking back over her five-decade career, photographer Jo Ann Callis would say nothing much has changed. "My interests have always been the same," she says, speaking from Culver City, Los Angeles where she has lived and worked since 1980. "I'm always trying to find new ways to express the same ideas."

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How To Get Offended - Ultra Spiritual Life episode 52

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Tijdschrift LOVER - FEMINISTISCHE KUNST VERSUS INSTAGRAM-CENSUUR

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Tijdschrift LOVER - FEMINISTISCHE KUNST VERSUS INSTAGRAM-CENSUUR

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Tijdschrift LOVER - feministische vechtlust

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Oscarwinnaar Steve McQueen maakte een indrukwekkende video-installatie over de Afro-Amerikaanse activist Paul Robeson, die 39 jaar werd gevolgd door de FBI

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'Deleted' en 'paragraph redacted', zegt een vrouwenstem in een monotone voice-over. 'Erased', 'confidential', 'pages withheld'. Ondertussen rollen op twee grote schermen die tegenover elkaar staan opgesteld langzaam maar onophoudelijk de [...]

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Interview with Meghan Boody – Blog | Mona

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New York artist Meghan Boody's bizarre pin-ball death machine, Deluxe Suicide Service, is on display in the museum at the moment. She's been making a new work for us in her stunning Tribeca tower (i.e. apartment), where she lives with her son and works with her familiars (assistants) on her art works: photographs, installations and sculptures that memorialise her psychic states, and trace her transformation from one mode of being to another. It's all deeply Freudian, but in a glamorous earth mother, as opposed to Woody Allen, kind of way. The new work is called The Mice and Me. It depicts herself as a child, encaged, in a pretty frock, with mice lapping at the drool that leaks from her silicone mouth. It's fully weird, and pretty amazing. It has recently arrived here in Hobart and will be on show at the museum soon.
Elizabeth Mead:
Is your work autobiographical?
Meghan Boody:Yes. I think that any blob of paint or dab of sputum has to be categorised as autobiographical. Some artists like to admit it and some don't.

MB:Mine is consciously that way, because what I try to do with my work is piece together things that I want to achieve in my life. They're almost like guide books of how to proceed. I try to figure out ways of transforming myself, to make myself happier.

MB: It has. Well for instance, in the Psyche and Smut series , I was very interested in getting pregnant. The series is about these two girls that start off as diametrically opposed twins, and they gradually merge to become one person. So it's about harmonising the warring factions of one's mind, and becoming a more integral, powerful person. There's a cluster of eggs that have been fertilised - that's that blue mass in the background. This was my way of meditating about being fertile. And I did get pregnant while making the series.

MB:It's both. The more I do it the clearer my objectives become, and each work builds on the past. It continues to distill. Often I start with a very different game plan than what I end up with. But ultimately it just ends up telling the same story.

MB: The story is about how to switch from one type of person to the next. Self-transformation. My hope is that by studying it in myself and giving myself guidelines, some of this will filter off to somebody else and be helpful.

MB:I think it was with the Henry's Wives series . I did a series based on the wives of Henry VIII. Each piece was devoted to one of the six queens - leading up to a seventh and last image where they have been resurrected and are celebrating Henry's demise. Each piece is titled after the motto that each queen had during her reign. So Katheryne Howard had the motto, 'No other wish but his'. The historical fact acts as an armature for my fantasy.

That's one way of perceiving the series. But also, each image is devoted to a different alchemic phase. Putrefaction, sublimation, coniunction... I felt like there were definitely things I wanted to change about my life, so I engaged in a process that studied alchemy, took to heart the lessons behind each process, and devoted a piece to it, in the hope that this would generate change in my life.

MB:Sure, you could say that. I was married to somebody who I was very unhappy with...

MB:I think it was like an escape hatch for me, growing up. I had a very solitary childhood. I used to escape into my room and make stuff. I lived for those moments, and then whenever there was a rap on my door it was like doomsday. And then of course my parents said, 'Oh, you're so artistic', and I rebelled against that and said, 'I don't want to be an artist'. It took me quite a long time to come back to it. In college I thought I was going to be a writer, then I tried my hand at fashion design, and I finally fell into photography, not purposefully.

MB:Photography is my base medium, but then it bleeds into sculpture. I go back and forth between the two, and combine them.

MB:You could definitely say that, or tableau. I do the same thing whether it's in photography or sculpture. I'm creating worlds, physical realms that are like little parallel universes I can slip into. They give me respite from this particular level of reality.

MB:Definitely, yep. I hope that that's what ends up happening. I feel like if it's believable for me, and if it's a place that I want to go to, other people might want to go there too.

MB:I do. But sometimes I back into it. Like Henry Darger for instance - I didn't even know he existed. Then I came across a book on him and I was like, 'Holy shit, this is so what I've been doing', so then I very consciously adopted some of his ideas. And there are certain things that I'm crazy about - Peter Greenaway for instance. I love the way he puts great attention into the frame of his movies - images within images, a layered story. And also, he and I are both very interested in old master painting.

MB:Yes, exactly. That's what I think is so important. No one's going to know about the alchemy - well, maybe now they will - but no-one's really going to have a clue that that was an underpinning of the work. But I think that just because it's there, as an underlying structure - that gives it some kind of integrity.

MB:If I like it. Because I'm so stringent and difficult, and a perfectionist. So if I don't despise it then chances are it's okay.

MB:I do, incessantly, and I'm actually thinking that maybe I could let up on myself a little bit, because it's rather onerous and it takes a really long time for me to make things. That's why it's taking me so long to make The Mice and Me - because I have to have the perfect chandelier and pendants, and garments for her to wear. I have to make sure it's flawless.
EM: What do you say to yourself when you're giving yourself a hard time?
MB:'That's disgusting, I hate it'. 'This is foul, it can't possibly exist'. I become outraged, and woe unto those who work for me because I'm just like, 'How dare you, this isn't right'.
Can you please tell me how you made The Mice and Me?
MB:Sure. The first thing I did was find my model. I was looking for somebody that could emulate myself as an eight or nine year-old child. So we found her and encased her body in silicone to make a mold. We did not do her head because that was sculpted freestyle from photographs of myself as a child.

MB:It was, and it was actually quite gruelling for her because she had no idea, and I had no idea, that it was going to take so long for the silicone to set up. It took about two hours, so she had to be perfectly still. This was a nine year-old girl and she was practically in tears. I felt so terrible - we were feeding her chocolate and ice cream and singing to her, whatever it took.

And then there's the positive made of the silicone mold, out of clay. Then you make another mold out of something very tough called Aqua-Resin, and that is what allows me to make additions. And then once I have that mold, I have a silicone casting made by special-effects people from the film industry. So all of the hairs have to be hand-punched individually, as do the eyebrows and eyelashes. It's all about the translucency of the skin and getting the pigments just right.

Then I [adjusted] the original cabinet and attached the old fire extinguisher - that's where the water reservoir and pump live. Then we got an electrician to wire the timer, lights and pump. And then the doors - they were bronze, and then coated in chrome. The chicken wire had to be chrome-plated too.

Then one of the big things to calibrate is the drool, and I'm so thrilled that we finally got that to work today.

MB:Oh, thank you. Well let's just make sure it doesn't flood. And then finally it's all about her outfit...

MB:Not for me. I find it very comforting, nostalgic. I grew up here in New York City, on 64 th street. I often feel a strange tug or presence when I walk by the apartment where I grew up. I look up into the window of my bedroom - and wouldn't it be wild if I saw myself as a child looking back down?

MB:So that's the kind of thing that fascinates me, that we all... How far away am I from that little girl that I once was? I think about all of the things that made me the way I am now, but I think of her separately from myself, as somebody that I'm interested in and I have great affection for. I guess it's positive if you can get to the point where you like that young person who is still living inside you.

She's in this enclosure, and it's unclear whether this is self- imprisonment or whether she's been put in there. Is this a little fairy bower paradise for her? Is she happy in there? But I like to think of it as an enclosed biosphere, a self-sustaining environment where she is providing nourishment for her little companions, the mice, and they're keeping her company. Now that I think about it, this is more like an ode to staying forever young. But I think if you can just accept that desire, and the impossibility of it, that it frees you from it, and allows you to grow up.
So the other work we have, Deluxe Suicide Service - how did that come about?
MB: That came about because I was always fascinated with games and machines, different arcade contraptions. I was always roaming around bric-a-brac shops, antique shops, anything, looking for something to insert my photographs into. I was also often going to a pinball bar at the time, playing a lot of pinball machines, and I thought, 'Wow, wouldn't that be so cool...' So I went to a pinball machine warehouse where old machines were waiting to be sold to bars or restaurants...

MB:Kind of, yeah, and it was unbelievable how cheap they were. Everybody wants the newest, best thing. I picked a machine whose components I liked, but one simple enough for me to add on to. Like some of the sounds are integral to the original game and some of them I added. The images are of friends commingled with found photographs, with several self-portraits sprinkled in. I got a lot of the sea imagery from old National Geographic magazines and the coin slot images are Bellini Madonnas. The score panel shows my subjects transposed against boudoirs of Victorian harlots from early Daguerreotypes. The numbers refer to the game score as well as referencing serial numbers of prisoners' mug shots.

I think of this piece as either a mobile crematorium or a life support system. It is unclear whether the electrodes and X-ray cables fastened onto the image of the prone girl are sucking the life out of her or restoring her vital fluids. The whole basis of Deluxe Suicide Service is playing a game, alluding to the game of life. Is it possible to gain mastery over one's life? It's really, in this case, an ode to the Id, and all sorts of dark impulses and drives.

MB:I think that if you can gain the illusion of control, that's just as good as getting control. It's all about identifying what those dark drives are and not fleeing from them. And the more you know them, the less likely they're going to come up and get you from behind.

MB:I love that line, yes. And all of my work is about that: aligning oneself with one's beast so it doesn't overpower you. If you don't know who you are, if you don't know about your dark compulsions, therein lies the road to insanity.

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Interview with Meghan Boody - Blog | Mona

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New York artist Meghan Boody's bizarre pin-ball death machine, Deluxe Suicide Service, is on display in the museum at the moment. She's been making a new work for us in her stunning Tribeca tower (i.e.

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This trans student's school tried to censor his artwork. Now it's going viral.

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Jasper Behrends just graduated from high school, but he's already making a name for himself as an artist. And it's all thanks to a viral tweet about his perseverance against artistic censorship.

On July 12, Behrends tweeted a selection of his work depicting gender, sexuality, and body dysphoria with the words, "My school's administration told me to stop doing my concentration on gender and sexuality because it was 'inappropriate.' But I didn't. And now..."

Alongside images from his portfolio, Behrends tweeted a letter from the College Board. The 18-year-old's art was selected to be featured in the 2017-2018 AP Studio Art Exhibit, a high national honor for AP art students.

The tweet has received more than 13,000 retweets in celebration of Behrends' art and resistance.

The viral tweet stems from a long battle Behrends had with the administration at his Virginia high school in his senior year. As part of his advanced placement studio art course, Behrends was required to do a deep dive into a specific subject matter, producing twelve pieces on the topic.

He chose to focus on trans identity. That's where trouble with his school began.

After he started to work on raw, unfiltered pieces, his work was censored by his school's administration for being too provocative.

"After starting my concentration, the school vice principal came to me about my 'potentially sensitive' concentration subject," Behrends told Mashable. "Keep in mind, at this point, all I had done was draw some breasts on a body that had a face presenting as male. The vice principal said that although he had no problem with the LGBTQ theme, there is a 'time and a place for these things,' and that it did not belong in public schools."

Behrends said the administration told him his work was expected to follow the school dress code, specifically forbidding him from illustrating shirtless figures in his pieces. But he says he illustrated breasts before, and other students were still allowed to include breasts in their pieces. The administration didn't budge on its ruling.

"Art is just materialized passion, and my passions stand with the queer community."

"After being shot down, I told my art teacher that I would rather just not turn anything in than switch my concentration to 'make it less intense' to suit those who might not be accustomed to being exposed to queer art," Behrends said. "My teacher, knowing that I was serious, told me that I should at least try to dull it down. After a lot of arguing, I just decided to ignore everyone and keep doing it."

But resisting the administration meant keeping his art a secret, unable to show his work in school art shows.

"I wasn't able to even show my parents, but I was proud of what I was doing," he said.

Eventually his work was seen by a panel of College Board critics unaffiliated with Behrends' school. The panel graded the art on a scale of 1 to 5.

Behrends earned a 5, the highest possible score, on the Studio Art AP Exam and his work was selected for the prestigious AP Studio Art Exhibit.

Behrends' work is heavy on emotion, unpacking some of the most harrowing and raw feelings impacting transgender people. While his only goal was to stick to the overall theme of gender dysphoria, it became necessary to include discomfort, too.

"I didn't really set out to make the viewer feel uncomfortable," he said. "I just wanted to visually show what a transgender person can go through on a daily basis. It wasn't until I started getting feedback that I realized that this work made cisgender people feel uncomfortable.

"I started running with that a little bit and wanted to try and see if I could get cisgender and heterosexual people to feel even a fraction of how alienated LGBTQ people feel every day."

The work created for his exam is currently housed in the young artist's online portfolio, where he has opened up about the harrowing meaning behind each image.

Behrends graduated in June and left his critical administration behind. But his passion for art, he said, will never be in the rearview.

"This is not the end of my queer art," he said. "Queer art is literally the only type of art I truly enjoy doing. Art is just materialized passion, and my passions stand with the queer community."

WATCH: Transgender teens speak to themselves 10 years from now

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This trans student's school tried to censor his artwork. Now it's going viral.

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Jasper Behrends just graduated from high school, but he's already making a name for himself as an artist. And it's all thanks to a viral tweet about his perseverance against artistic censorship.

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From Duchamp's urinal 'Fountain' to Bowie trolling the art world with his own publishing house, and Insta-art that isn't all that it seems

The art world means serious business. Paintings and sculptures sell for hundreds of millions of pounds at the drop of a gavel, works are stolen and sold on the black market, and the authenticity of others have divided elitist circles worldwide. Naturally, all this lays the groundwork for some good old fashioned trolling. From surrealists to web-savvy pranksters, art history is plagued with examples of tricks and jokes that at best, have provoked laughter, or worse, stirred international outrage. And yet, beyond their immediate effects on people's nerves, the most controversial works of art often voice essential critiques to the art world and society.

To celebrate artists' dedication to trolling everybody, we've penned a guide to some of the best controversial works that divided opinion.

DAMIEN HIRST'S TREASURES FROM THE WRECK OF THE UNBELIEVABLE

At the beginning of January, artist Damien Hirst released a documentary about his Venice 'comeback' show - that colossal and highly controversial exhibition that took him a mere ten years and $65 million to put together. In April of 2017, Treasures from the Wreck of the Unbelievable filled two museums with "long-lost treasures" that the artist had supposedly rescued from the bottom of east African seas. Was Hirst fooling visitors with yet another comedy show labelled as Art? Objects that the artist salvaged from the sunken ship of Cif Amotan II - an anagram for "I Am Fiction" - included "Made In China" imprinted bronze figures alongside busts of Ancient Egyptian deities that looked suspiciously similar to Pharrell Williams and Rihanna, amongst other contemporary celebrities. Unsurprisingly, the show caused an uproar. But whether Hirst's work was "fake news" or " art for a post-truth world", audacious or kitsch, history or fiction, doesn't matter. "As an artist," Hirst told Vulture, "the best you can hope for is people arguing, mixed reviews. Love it and hate it. If you get that, then you're on the right track. If everyone loves or everyone hates it, you're in trouble." This is not the first time the Bristol-born showman has divided opinion. Looking back, an underwater fantasy is what one would expect from a man that exhibited a 14-foot embalmed tiger shark, a tacky diamond encrusted skull and once made Sienna Miller smear herself in blood for a music video.

AMALIA ULMAN'S "EXCELLENCES & PERFECTIONS"

Amalia Ulman - aka " The First Great Instagram Artist " - took performance art to the next level by reinventing herself online. Like any 20-something riding the zeitgeist of the internet age, Ulman started posting photos on Instagram in 2014. What first seemed like commonplace new-age narcissism was later revealed to be a provocative and entirely staged work of art. Without any knowledge of the prank, one could have assumed she was yet another of those posing, spammy "hot girls" on the app's explore page. Titled "Excellences & Perfections", Ulman carefully crafted a fictionalised Instagram persona living the high life and at once calling attention to how we view and judge women online while showing how malleable identity is in the social media echo-chamber.

RICHARD PRINCE'S NEW PORTRAITS

In 2014, Richard Prince put up a show - ironically titled New Portraits - consisting of other people's photos that the artist had just screenshot and printed off of Instagram onto six-foot tall blank canvases. The only changes he made were cryptic remarks that Prince added to the comment threads. Was this " genius trolling"? Or vulgar appropriation? The American artist " rephotographed" the images - without permission - and turned them into museum pieces. Depicting scenes of everyday self-obsession, girls in their underwear and stock-like photography, the artworks would not have caused such outrage had they not been sold for as much as $100k at Frieze. One of the women on the photos, Missy Suicide from pin-up collective Suicide Girls, began selling the Prince-appropriated image for $90 on the social media platform, with the caption "Do we have Mr. Prince's permission to sell these prints? We have the same permission from him that he had from us. ;)" A bargain! Same thing, just about 99.9 per cent cheaper than Prince's 'original' copy.

BANKSY... MULTIPLE TIMES

Known for his culture-jamming graffitis, Banksy has also pulled a few pranks on the industry. In 2003, the artist, hammer and nail in hand, managed to hang his own work on one of the Tate Modern's walls alongside a caption that read: "This new acquisition is a beautiful example of the neo post-idiotic style. Little is known about Banksy whose work is inspired by cannabis resin and daytime television." The work, titled, "Crimewatch UK Has Ruined the Countryside For All of Us", dropped off the wall and was quickly discovered to be an imposter. In 2013, as part of the 13th daily installment of Better Out Than In, his one-month residency in NYC, Banksy set up a booth in Central Park that sold authentic original canvases of his for just $60. Amidst the many stalls selling tourist junk and cheap art replicas in the area, the price tag was deemed too high and only a few passers-by purchased the works. It was later revealed that the art on sale was authentic and estimated at $225,000. One fortunate buyer auctioned their $60 ripoff for a cool £125,000. If one thing, Banksy's prank confirmed that as much as the anonymous artist has infiltrated and cashed in on a multi-million industry, he seems very aware of the shady, often absurd commodification of art by the market's all-powerful hedge fund dudes.

MARCEL DUCHAMP'S "FOUNTAIN"

Doubtless, some of art history's first stunts can be traced back to Dadaism and Surrealism. Beginning in the 1910s and 20s, Surrealists searched to expand the materials and methods employed to make people laugh all the while brutally rejecting society. The likes of Dali, Man Ray, Buñuel and others were constantly challenging the viewers' tolerance to radical viewpoints as they pushed the boundaries of what could and should be considered art. One such example is Marcel Duchamp's "Fountain", a standard urinal of the time, unaltered, upturned, that the artist - signing as "R MUTT" - put on a pedestal in 1917. Submitted to the Society of Independent Artists' exhibition in New York, it was the French Surrealist's attempt to put at test the committee's founding principle, "to reject no work". Even if it was indeed rejected, Duchamp made a small amount of replicas that today sit in museums and galleries across the world. From Duchamp's urinal to Magritte's The Treachery of Images, Surrealism's absurdist humour has permeated our cultural memory everywhere from Pop Art to the punk project of the Young British Artists.

CARL ANDRE'S "BRICKS"

"Is this art?" is a question that one often contemplates when faced with conceptual art. Can some old bricks laid in a rectangular shape on bare floor be art? This puzzle arose in 1976 when the Tate purchased Carle Andre's Equivalent VIII, more commonly referred to as "a pile of bricks". Thirty years have passed and The Independent admits: "We still can't decide". Back in the 1970s, the American artist's work was slammed by critics asking why "taxpayers' money" had been spent on "a load of bricks". Like it or not, visitors rushed to the museum, as Arthur Payne, a Gallery Assistant described to the Evening Standard "...these bricks have really brought the public in. They can't make head or tail of them. Nothing has attracted as much attention as they have." As you can guess, the bricks controversy anticipated many more scandals to come including Turner prize winner Martin Creed's shredded paper balls or his WORK NO. 227 subtitled " the lights going on and off". While these works draw on humour, no stunt was necessarily intended. If fans of these works are scarce, at least some have found inspiration in them to produce their own brand of artsy pranks with everyday objects such as a pair of glasses, a pineapple or a trash can.

DAVID BOWIE'S 21 PUBLISHING

Celebrated for his extensive musical career, David Bowie was a multi-hyphenate artist. He played Andy Warhol in the film Basquiat and danced on Soul Train, the TV show, but very few know him as the founder of a small art book publishing house called 21 Publishing. The British pop star envisioned it as a platform to mock art world elitism and make art accessible to the masses. In a 1998 interview with ArtNews, he explained: "The great freedom within a small indie company like ourselves is that we get the last word on how something is presented and which books we publish." And so he did. As William Boyd narrates for The Guardian, Bowie published Nat Tate: an American Artist 1928-1960, the biography of a completely made up American artist. A few years in the making, Boyd had constructed a credible persona, that of a troubled prodigy who, as it happens, destroyed most of his own work and killed himself at the age of 32 in 1960. The author of the book himself created the 'surviving' artworks and found in antique shops the necessary photos to illustrate Nat Tate's life story. On April Fool's Day, 1998, David Bowie organised a launch party in Jeff Koons's studio where he read extracts from the book, "absolutely deadpan, to the assembled New York glitterati."

DA VINCI'S SALVATOR MUNDI

Last November, Leonardo Da Vinci made the headlines after Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, acquired "Salvator Mundi" for $450.3 million. At that price, "Mundi" became the highest-priced work of art sold privately or at auction. Originally commissioned by the French royal family in the 16th century, the painting went missing for hundreds of years, before popping up in private collections in the late 19th century. First attributed to Boltraffio, one of Leonardo's pupils, the painting sold for £45 when it showed up at a Sotheby's London auction in 1958. It's only in 2011, after a New York art dealer purchased it at an estate sale that the piece was authenticated as a bona fide Da Vinci. The resurfaced painting generated enormous hype, described by connoisseurs as the " holy face of the 21st century" and " an art world miracle". Some scholars, however, have questioned its authenticity, The Guardian reported, due to the glass orb that Jesus Christ, depicted in the painting, holds in his left hand. It is said that the bubble does not refract or distort light the way it should, which is surprising for a painter and scientist like Da Vinci who was obsessed by optic effects. Others claim that the artwork is authentic, but that Da Vinci purposely painted an incorrect glass globe not to distract the viewers from the truly important subject of the work, Christ himself.

ORSON WELLES' "WAR OF THE WORLDS"

Okay, not "technically" an "artwork", but a good story nonetheless. Eighty years ago, Orson Welles' infamous War of the Worlds broadcast - an adaptation of H. G. Wells' novel The War of the Worlds (1898) - resulted in mass panic, as listeners believed the country was legit under a deadly Martian attack. For the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the event, Slate questioned whether the nation-wide hysteria the press had reported had in fact been that massive - concluding that it had been exaggerated. Whatever the number of beguiled fools was, Welles' brilliant radio performance of alien invasion remains a classic example of artistic mischief - whether the prank was intended or not.

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The controversial art works that sent the world into a spin

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The art world means serious business. Paintings and sculptures sell for hundreds of millions of pounds at the drop of a gavel, works are stolen and sold on the black market, and the authenticity of others have divided elitist circles worldwide. Naturally, all this lays the groundwork for some good old fashioned trolling.

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What is the right balance to strike between freedom of and restrictions upon artistic expression?

Please cast your vote after you've read the arguments.
You can also add to the debate by leaving a comment at the end of the page.

What do you think?

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What is the right balance to strike between freedom of and restrictions upon artistic expression? Please cast your vote after you've read the arguments.You can also add to the debate by leaving a comment at the end of the page. What do you think?

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Paul de Leeuw zingt dit nummer nu ook en zegt dat er niet veel veranderd is.
Voor mij een ontdekking dat zo lang geleden al over dit onderwerp gesproken werd.

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Willem Nijholt "Sorry dat ik besta" Musical "Foxtrot" (7), 1977.

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Me Too gaat over het taboe wat er heerst om over seuxuele intimidatie te praten. Vaak worden slachtoffers hiervan namelijk als medeplichtig gezien. Dit is een onuitgesproken 'regel' die MeToo wil doorbreken.
Echter: er ontstaat een welles-nietes discussie (net als bij Zwarte Piet=Racisme). Er is kritiek op de 'heksenjacht' die er kan ontstaan.

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Me Too (of #MeToo) is een hashtag op Twitter en andere sociale media die in oktober 2017 viraal (als een lopend vuurtje) ging. Wie #MeToo plaatst geeft daarmee aan met seksuele intimidatie of aanranding te maken hebben gehad. De hashtag kreeg populariteit nadat Hollywood- producent Harvey Weinstein van seksuele intimidatie was beticht door verschillende vrouwen.

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Pipilotti Rist

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Pipilotti Rist Interview: Color is Dangerous

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Meet the sensuous Swiss video artist Pipilotti Rist, whose work full of colour and playfulness. She here argues that videos can have painterly qualities and tells the story of one of her most famous videos, where a woman smashes car windows with a flower.

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Het Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam presenteert van 26 mei t/m 14 oktober 2018 een overzichtstentoonstelling van de Duitse kunstenaar Günther Förg (1952-2013). A Fragile Beauty toont het oeuvre van een rebelse geest die kritisch en speels maar ook uiterst seri

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Ze is beinvloed door dad.,
ik heb haar erbij gedaan omdat ze iets rebels heeft

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Yoko Ono
A Thing Called Life

"I just wanted to clear the air."

"The incredible changes that you go through, is life. Life is complex, confusing. The sky is very permanent, not changing." Interview with the pioneering artist Yoko Ono about how life and art are connected in her work, which she sees as a means for simplifying things. Read more ...

Yoko Ono talks of her performance Sky Piece to Jesus Christ (1965), her interest in music, her use of her voice, as well as more generally about her ideas and working methods. "I just wanted to clear the air" she says of her screaming. She also talks of the relationship between body and mind, and how the body is a kind of material, you can work with. Her interest is mainly the spirit, or concept of things: "We're all together in a thing called life. It's really great. And it's very interesting, because the wind is blowing, the weather, the temperature, or the light, and I'm suddenly standing in another country. Very real."

Yoko Ono (b. 1933) is a Japanese avant-garde artist and musician. Ono was born in Tokyo, but moved to New York when she was 18, becoming becoming an influential practitioner of conceptual and performance art in the 1960s and consequently one of the most important representatives of the fluxus movement. As a musician, Ono embarked on a music career with Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band (1970) and also collaborated with huband and artistic partner, musician John Lennon (b.1940-s.1980), on Grammy Award winning albums such as 'Double Fantasy' (1980). In 1989, the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City presented a retrospective of Ono's work, and in 2000 the retrospective, 'Yes Yoko Ono', opened at the Japan Society Gallery in New York City and traveled extensively thereafter. In 2015, the Museum of Modern Art in New York City presented a retrospective of her early art. Among several prestigious awards, Ono received a Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the 2009 Venice Biennale.

Yoko Ono was interviewed by Synne Rifberg at Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Humlebæk, Denmark.

Camera: Klaus Elmer, Nicolaj Jungersen & Mathias Nyholm
Edited by: Kamilla Bruus
Colorgrade: Honey Biba Beckerlee
Produced by: Marc-Christoph Wagner
Copyright: Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, 2013

Supported by Nordea-fonden.

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"The incredible changes that you go through, is life. Life is complex, confusing. The sky is very permanent, not changing." Interview with the pioneering artist Yoko Ono about how life and art are connected in her work, which she sees as a means for simplifying things.

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Jacky dit vind ik zooo aangrijpend!

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Love Story (2016), a seven-channel installation by Candice Breitz, interrogates the mechanics of identification and the conditions under which empathy is produced.

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Barbara Kruger – Consumerism, Power and the Everyday | Fresh Perspectives | Tate Collective

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DAVID BOWIE PUSHED THE LIMITS OF MUSIC, ART & FASHION

Bowie was an artist and an explorer that embodied true individuality that our generation craves

by Fiona Ma

In the age of our commoditised and sanitised world where stylists choose our clothes, where record labels prescribe our playlist and PR organizations choose the words we hear; David Bowie was a true individual, the authentic antagonist to pop culture.

Experimenting on his own terms, Bowie was an un-defineable force. He never let established notions of 'what should be' govern his discourse evidenced through writing songs about being an outsider - an alien, a misfit, a sexual adventurer - who took risks before it was in vogue to whisper the term gender-blending.

Free-spirited, he was much more a part of the avant-garde than the 'pop-star' label that he was often classified as. Dispirited with what was on offer, Bowie's style choices reflected his experiments in persona. Ditching the boy for the alien androgyne that was Ziggy Stardust - his flaming locks and hand-made clothing ignited his burgeoning legacy. A constant surge of dynamic self-creation, Bowie liberated all creative boundaries, "I really had a hunger to experience everything that life had to offer, from the opium den to whatever. And I think I have done just about everything that it's possible to do".

We hunger for icons like David Bowie, sincere and fearless in his self-conception that embody the spirit of a true artist; Bowie's rejection of society's conventions liberated us, a legend that still continues to influence us today.

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DAVID BOWIE PUSHED THE LIMITS OF MUSIC, ART & FASHION

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Bowie was an artist and an explorer that embodied true individuality that our generation craves by Fiona Ma In the age of our commoditised and sanitised world where stylists choose our clothes, where record labels prescribe our playlist and PR organizations choose the words we hear; David Bowie was a true individual, the authentic antagonist to pop culture.

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Francis bacon: A Brush with Violence BBC2 2017

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Francis Bacon was the loudest, rudest, drunkest, most sought-after British artist of the 20th century. Twenty-five years after his death, his canvases regularly exceed £40million at auction. Bacon's appeal is rooted in his notoriety - a candid image he presented of himself as Roaring Boy, Lord of Misrule and Conveyor of Artistic Violence. This was true enough, but only part of the truth. He carefully cultivated the facade, protecting the complex and haunted man behind the myth. In this unique, compelling film, those who knew him speak freely, some for the first time, to reveal the many mysteries of Francis Bacon.

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Cuban artist and creative director Erik Ravelo is used to having his artwork censored. He was, after all, the man behind United Colors of Benetton's UnHate campaign, which featured doctored photos of world leaders making out.

Yet his newest project, a personal artwork unrelated to his career as a creative director, has managed to spark even more controversy "I had people writing me, threatening me," he said in a phone conversation with the Huffington Post. "At first the project was fun but it got a little out of hand."

"Los Intocables," which translates to "The Untouchables," is what Ravelo refers to as a "human installation," featuring a variety of issues plaguing children around the world. "The right to childhood should be protected," Ravelo writes on his website, a theme driving the visually disturbing works.

Each work features both a child and an adult posed to demonstrate a contemporary evil, whether it be gun violence, molestation or the threat of nuclear war. Each work features a child being crucified on the back of an adult, each scene attempting to tell a different story about the loss of innocence. The human sculptures are then photographed with the child's face blurred, resulting in images as visually jarring as they are conceptually saddening. "It's art, it's communication," Ravelo explained.

Ravelo's project has been, according to the artist, censored by Facebook. Halting his "likes" at 18,000 -- where it had landed after just a few days. He has also been prevented from uploading more images. "I am used to governmental censorship from Cuba but with this," he paused, "my first reaction was 'woah.'" The Huffington Post has reached out to Facebook for a response and has not yet heard back.

When asked if he planned to fight the online censorship, Ravelo responded: "I am not even that interested in fighting; I am more interested in promoting my work."

Take a look at the dark series below and let us know if you think the works deserved to be censored.

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Did This Art Project Deserve To Be Censored By Facebook?

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Cuban artist and creative director Erik Ravelo is used to having his artwork censored. He was, after all, the man behind United Colors of Benetton's UnHate campaign, which featured doctored photos of world leaders making out.

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Start programma's waar en wanneer je maar wilt op NPO Start. Met NPO Plus kijk je zonder reclame alle afleveringen van je favoriete Nederlandse series.

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De lange weg van Bill Viola gemist? Start met kijken op NPO Start

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Het is een gedurfd experiment: twee permanente video-installaties als altaarstukken realiseren in een van 's werelds beroemdste kerken: St. Paul's Cathedral.

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Erik Ravelo - UNHATE Foundation - Untouchables | AdForum Talent: The creative industry network.

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Television & Cinema Untouchables for UNHATE Foundation by Fabrica - The campaign's idea was shaped around one statement: The right to childhood shoul...

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The premise behind clicktivism is that social media allows for quick and easy ways to support an organization or cause. The rise of social, and other digital media, has seen an equally large surge in the way that NGOs utilize the Internet for campaigning, and so to limit clicktivism to solely the promotion of a cause does it, and the work that these organizations have done, a disservice.

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Clicktivisme, #-tagrevoluties en een opstand van de elite - 23 april 2018

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‘Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion’, Francis Bacon, c.1944 | Tate

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‘Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion‘, Francis Bacon, 1944 | Tate

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‘Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion‘, Francis Bacon, 1944 on display at Tate Britain.

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JR Inside Out Art Holds Lessons For Immigration Debate | Time

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What a Work of Art Can Teach Us About Dishonest Portrayals of Immigrants

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French artist JR's portrait of a Dreamer is important rebuttal for Trump administration's dark, dishonest portrayal of immigrants.

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trailer version: STILL LIFE - AND SOFTLY SLUMBERS ... by Angie Hiesl and Roland Kaiser

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(trailer version)
A performative urban intervention from the
URBAN-CITY-URBAN cycle
by
Angie Hiesl and Roland Kaiser

Performer
Fa-Hsuan Chen - Taiwan
Mack Kubicki - Germany

STILL LIFE – AND SOFTLY SLUMBERS... is the latest production by performance artists Angie Hiesl + Roland Kaiser and - after PICK’n’PLACE (2010) and DRESSING THE CITY AND MY HEAD IS A SHIRT (2011) - the third part of URBAN-CITY-URBAN – a project cycle spanning several years.. In STILL LIFE AND SOFTLY SLUMBERS... , violence in the private and public sphere is the focus of the visual performance work.

Christmas, the “festival of love and a family celebration” likes to rejoice in an intact world, but behind many facades unimaginable abysses lie hidden. STILL LIFE – AND SOFTLY SLUMBERS… adds unpleasant undertones to the pre-Christmas goings-on in the city.

Video produced by Basa Vujin-Stein
www.bvs-videodocumentation.de

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The Fear of Art: Reflections on Art Censorship and Banning

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Censuur gemist? Start met kijken op NPO Start

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In deze eerste aflevering van seizoen acht onderzoekt Arjen de huidige ontwikkelingen op gebied van censuur in Europa, naar aanleiding van de website EU vs Disinfo.

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Artistieke vrijheid is, zoals alle vrijheden, geen vaststaand begrip. De artistieke vrijheid staat permanent onder druk en moet continu bevochten en verdedigd worden tegen bloeddorstige armen van geest maar ook tegen wolven die in schaapskleren kunst censureren.

Op 9 januari meldde de Volkskrant dat werk van Dirk Hardy geweerd is door de gemeente Binnenmaas. Het fotografisch zesluik bevat afbeeldingen van Hitler en Christus en zou bezoekers van het gemeentehuis wel eens kunnen afschrikken, aldus de gemeente die de kunstenaar nota bene op eigen initiatief uitnodigde. Tegen Stalin, die ook afgebeeld is, had men daarentegen geen enkel bezwaar.

Als kwetsend ervaren

Het zesluik Clay van Dirk Hardy stamt uit 2014 en staat al enige tijd pontificaal op zijn website. De verantwoordelijke ambtenaar moest het werk van Hardy wel kennen toen hij de kunstenaar uitnodigde. In een bizarre statement in het Algemeen Dagblad stelt de gemeente: "Mensen die binnenkomen, komen niet voor een tentoonstelling maar bijvoorbeeld voor het aanvragen van een paspoort. Zij worden ongevraagd geconfronteerd met een kunstwerk dat zij als kwetsend kunnen ervaren."
Volslagen onzin natuurlijk want het is de gemeente zelf die de expositie in het gemeentehuis organiseert.

De van Atelier Van Lieshout, een vrouwenromp zonder hoofd en ledematen, werd in 2014 verplaatst omdat machinisten er aanstoot aan namen (het kunstwerk stond aan een spoor bij Lisse). De overeenkomst tussen Atelier Van Lieshout en de Stichting Kasteel De Keukenhof kon door de laatste kennelijk eenzijdig worden verbroken, waarbij de kunstenaars het nakijken hadden. Volgens Harm Verhagen, bedrijfsleider van Atelier Van Lieshout, nodigde hij de klagende machinisten nog uit om de Bikinibar te bekijken en om ze de bedoeling van het werk uit te leggen. "We kregen te horen dat zij ons wel een rondleiding door het mortuarium zouden geven".

Muurschildering

In 2011 maakte graffiti-kunstenaar Onno van Leeuwen in opdracht van de gemeente Schiedam een muurschildering onder een viaduct in de stad. Anno 2014 werd het werk verwijderd, zonder de kunstenaar hierover te informeren. Volgens de gemeente Schiedam zou de muurschildering uitnodigen tot meer graffiti en werd de muur herkalkt. Van Leeuwen: "Dat is de meest belachelijke uitspraak die ik in tijden heb gehoord. De enige graffiti waar andere niet op krabbelen, is juist een muurschildering van iemand uit de graffiti-scene die zwaar respect heeft op straat."

Zelfs Nederlandse universiteiten, die een vrijplaats moeten zijn van zelfontplooiing, maken zich schuldig aan het inperken van artistieke vrijheid. In 2013 verwijderde de Erasmus Universiteit te Rotterdam twee naaktportretten van Manuel Kneepkens uit de Faculty Club. De Radboud Universiteit in Nijmegen deed dat jaar hetzelfde met een werk van Elmer de Gruijl.

De burger mogelijkheden ontnomen

En zo zijn er tal van voorbeelden van censuur op kunst in ons 'moderne' Nederland. Zoals Hardy aan het Algemeen Dagblad terecht opmerkt, bepalen instanties als de gemeente Binnenmaas blijkbaar welke kunst zij geschikt achten voor bezoekers. Zo ontnemen zij de burger de mogelijkheid zelf een mening te vormen.

De Stichting Kasteel De Keukenhof bepaalt op haar beurt dat de stem van een stel kleinzerige machinisten belangrijker is dan die van degenen die het werk wel waarderen, niet in de laatste plaats van de beeldend kunstenaars die het werk hebben gemaakt. Het getuigt bovenal van gebrek aan respect voor kunst en kunstenaars, maar ook van een zeer lage dunk van het publiek en hun vermogen te incasseren.

Vijanden van artistieke vrijheid

Als gemeentebesturen, universiteiten, kasteelstichtingen en NS-personeel gaan bepalen welke kunst er in Nederland wordt tentoongesteld, is er sprake van censuur in een mate die serieus te nemen is. Vooral die machtswellustelingen moeten de autonome beeldend kunstenaars vrezen. Zij die kunst verwijderen en het kunstaanbod verarmen, zijn de ware vijanden van artistieke vrijheid in Nederland.

Hoe is het mogelijk dat afspraken met kunstenaars zomaar met voeten getreden kunnen worden? Staat de kunstenaar machteloos? Als kunst verwijderd wordt zonder dit mee te delen aan de kunstenaar - zoals in het geval van graffiti-kunstenaar Van Leeuwen - is dat meestal definitief. Verzet van kunstenaars tegen het censureren van hun werk blijft vaak achterwege. Waarom hebben de kunstenaars van Atelier Van Lieshout zich niet vastgeketend aan hun Bikinibar? Waarom heeft Hardy zijn werk niet gewoon opgehangen in het gemeentehuis van Binnenmaas en het zo stevig in de muur verankerd dat het met geen mogelijkheid van de wand gehaald kon worden? Belangrijker: waarom zijn deze kunstenaars niet naar de rechter gestapt?

Underground

Het klinkt zo logisch, maar afspraken die kunstenaars met instanties maken moeten zij altijd zwart op wit zetten. Dat is wrang maar in Nederland moet je als kunstenaar nu eenmaal rekening houden met de geldingsdrang van Sovjetsujetten. Bindende contracten zijn de belangrijkste wapens in rechtszaal. Door die contracten kan een werk geen millimeter verplaatst worden zonder goedkeuring van de maker en wordt de rechtspositie van de kunstenaar versterkt.

Voor de beeldend kunstenaar is het in deze vertruttende tijden erg lastig volwaardig gesprekspartner te zijn in maatschappelijke debatten. Door Jet Bussemaker en Halbe Zijlstra is het kunstenaarschap verworden tot een verdienmodel. Kritische, ongemakkelijke kunst verkoopt niet. Confronterende, voor armen van geest beledigende kunst krijgt zelden een platform. De beeldend kunstenaar moet underground, naar een wereld onder de zichtbare, over-gepromote 'kunstwereld' waar overheid en culturele instanties de scepter zwaaien.

In de underground-scene worden subsidies veracht, wordt men niet gedwongen deel te nemen aan de verwoestende commercialisering van cultuur en zijn beeldend kunstenaars nog werkelijk onafhankelijk. Daar kan dat het 'heilige' beschimpt en gehekeld wordt en hebben de Halbe Zijlstra's van deze wereld geen invloed meer en zijn ze persona non grata.

Als Charlies vermomde Sovjetsujetten

In die artistieke onderwereld ligt de toekomst van de Nederlandse beeldende kunst. In de bovenwereld, de 'kunstwereld' waar de kunstenaar de speelbal is geworden van culturele instanties en ambtenarij, wordt het publiek alleen nog maar behaagd. De beeldende kunst moet het hebben van kunstenaars die standvastig hun tegendraadse, ongemakkelijke werk maken en tonen. Zij prikkelen het publiek en verlagen zich niet tot clichés en simpel vermaak. In de toonzalen van de ingedutte, gerenommeerde en gesubsidieerde instituten zal men hun werk niet aantreffen. Zij doemen op uit het niets om onaangenaam te verrassen.

Aandoenlijk, al die steunbetuigingen aan de slachtoffers van de aanslag op Charlie Hebdo, een massale steunbetuiging aan het recht op artistieke vrijheid en de noodzaak ervan. Vanaf de Dam weerklonk de roep dat ongemakkelijke kunst waardevol is en getoond moet kunnen worden. Toch is het wachten op het eerstvolgende krantenbericht waarin staat dat kunst verwijderd is omdat die kwetsend zou kunnen zijn voor tere zieltjes, of omdat iemand dat voor hen had ingevuld.

Stonden daar op de Dam ook de ambtenaren van de gemeente Binnenmaas en Schiedam, de voorzitter van Stichting Kasteel De Keukenhof, die verzuurde machinisten, de besturen van de Erasmus en van de Radboud Universiteit? Als zij er al stonden, stonden ze er als Sovjetsujetten vermomd als 'Charlies'.

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Kunstcensuur in Nederland: de noodzaak van artistieke vrijheid | ThePostOnline

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Artistieke vrijheid is, zoals alle vrijheden, geen vaststaand begrip. De artistieke vrijheid staat permanent onder druk en moet continu bevochten en verdedigd worden tegen bloeddorstige armen van geest maar ook tegen wolven die in schaapskleren kunst censureren. Op 9 januari meldde de Volkskrant dat werk van Dirk Hardy geweerd is door de gemeente Binnenmaas.

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Art and culture are popular targets of censorship. NCAC's Art and Culture Censorship Timeline shows you how art and cultural censorship have evolved over time.

San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD) votes to remove 1930s Works Progress Administration (WPA) murals at George Washington High School. June 25, 2019: At issue are depictions of George Washington's slaves and violence against Native Americans. The murals, created in fresco by Russian-American social realist painter Victor Arnautoff, can only be removed by the irreversible act of destroying them. Complaints about the murals first arose in the 1960s, leading the school to commission murals from artist Dewey Crumpler to offer positive imagery of people of color. But a 2017 proposal to designate George Washington High School as a historical landmark reignited calls for the murals to be removed. The school convenes a Reflection and Action Group which recommends that the murals be removed. Arts advocates and anti-censorship organizations, including NCAC, call for additional educational programming around the murals. The murals' critics argue that Black and Native American students are traumatized by these images of the historical violence and oppression of their ancestors. Advocates for preserving the murals maintain that this art must be considered in its historical and social context and that arguments for removal do not give students enough credit for their ability to grapple with complexity. August 13, 2019: The San Francisco Unified School District votes to reverse their decision to destroy the murals and to instead cover them with panels. More details available here.

Los Angeles School Plans to Whitewash Mural That Offends Korean Activists. December 2018: The superintendent of a Los Angeles school district (LAUSD) unilaterally decides to remove a mural from the exterior wall of a high school gym. The National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) disagrees with this decision and urges the school district to reconsider. The mural, by artist Beau Stanton, was created as part of an arts initiative at the school, which involved workshops and seminars with students. The Kennedy Foundation grant-funded mural was vetted by the school district and intended as an homage to actress Ava Gardner. The radiating design element is found in many of Stanton's murals. Some community members represented by the Wilshire Community Coalition are offended by the rays, which they associate with the Japanese imperialist Rising Sun flag, and call for the erasure of the entire mural. In late December, LAUSD postpones its plans to remove the mural until after the holidays. In late May 2019, after intervention from artists, advocates and community groups, a compromise is reached that will allow the mural to remain with Stanton overseeing changes to the work.

Pulphus, et al v. Stephen Ayers is dismissed by the D.C. Circuit court. Nov. 30, 2018: the D.C. Circuit dismissed the lawsuit as moot because the 2016 art competition-and its corresponding Capitol exhibition have ended-so there was no longer any injury for the court to redress. In its opinion in Pulphus v. Ayers, the court rejected Pulphus's arguments that the case continues to present a live controversy, finding the case moot.

An abrupt policy change by the US Department of Defense prohibits art created by detainees at Guantanamo Bay from leaving the base, even in the event of a detainee's release. November 2017-January 2018: This new policy appears to have been inspired by an exhibition of artwork created by detainees, hosted at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York. The policy is the subject of an official letter sent by NCAC and 10 co-signatories to President Donald Trump; Secretary of Defense James Mattis; Deputy Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan; US Navy Commander, Rear Admiral Edward Cashman; and US Marine Corps Sergeant Major Dennis Bradley. The letter warns that the new policy flagrantly stifles any public discussion that could arise from viewing the art, and therefore the artistic and human side, of Guantanamo detainees. Art that has previously left the base has been subjected to intense military scrutiny before being cleared for release. Absent security concerns raised by that review, this policy also violates the human rights of the detainees under international norms. Further, the directive suppresses documents of clear political and historical importance to the American public.

Walker Art Center Destroys Controversial Sam Durant Sculpture. May-June 2017: Minneapolis' Walker Art Center became the center of a heated controversy over Scaffold, a massive 2012 work by Los Angeles artist Sam Durant meant to create awareness about capital punishment and its disproportionate effect on people of color. Scaffold is based on designs for gallows used in seven U.S. state-sanctioned executions, including 38 Dakota men hung in Mankato, Minnesota in 1862. The installation was not discussed in advance with the local Dakota community, and it sparked a protest and demands for it to be destroyed. After a meeting with Dakota tribal elders, a determination was made to dismantle the sculpture and burn the wood in a ceremony; Durant pledged to not re-create the work, and to transfer his intellectual property rights to the work to the Dakota tribe.

2016

OUTFRONT Media Rejects Public Art Billboard Proposal by Artist Dread Scott, August-November 2016: Outfront Media rejects artist Dread Scott's proposal for a billboard displayed at the alternative Kansas City art space 50/50's Black Lives Matter exhibition on the grounds that it violates their policy against "negative advertising." The design includes a list of names of those killed in recent police violence juxtaposed with a photograph of Scott's flag decrying police lynching. When Scott proposes a modified design, (and after receiving pressure), Outfront Media reverses its decision.

2015

2014

Damien Hirst's The Virgin Mother Covered Up on Long Island, May 2014: Community members of Long Island's Village of Old Westbury place restrictions on The Virgin Mother, a 33-foot sculpture by Damien Hirst, in the art-filled estate of developer Aby Rosen. A black tarp is placed over the sculpture because the monumental nude pregnant woman was "giving children nightmares."

2013

Kansas University Removes Art and Closes Exhibition Hall, July 2013: Dykes Library Interim Director Dr. Vince Loffredo orders the removal of Tom Gregg: Unsold - Grenades, Cute Animals and Bad Apples ahead of its scheduled end date, and closes the exhibition hall permanently. The work featured in Unsold - including paintings of grenades, pistols, and rotten apples - apparently did not support the campus' "core mission."

2012

John Michael Kohler Art Center Censors Family Exhibition, October 2012: The Art Center removes Betsey Schneider's photographic series Quotidian due to complaints concerning nudity. The photographs were part of the kids are all right exhibition and are a documentation of Schneider's daughter growing up that includes images in which she is nude.

2011

2010

David Wojnarowicz Video Censored, December 2010: The Smithsonian Institution pulls David Wojnarowicz' video Fire In My Belly from the exhibition Hide/Seek at the National Portrait Gallery.

Blu's mural being whitewashed, LA MOCA

2009

2008

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Closes Art Exhibit, March 2008: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY closes "Virtual Jihadi," a video art exhibition by Iraqi-American artist Wafaa Bilal, and announces the creation of a committee to "vet and monitor" artwork on campus after College Republicans vocally oppose the exhibition. The work is then displayed by The Sanctuary for Independent Media, a private exhibition space. But the controversy does not end there: the City Commissioner for Public Works leads a protest demonstration at the opening, and, in a suspicious coincidence, the next day The Sanctuary is closed for a building code violation.

2006

FBI Investigates Artists at Columbia College Exhibition, March 2006: FBI agents turn up before the public opening of the exhibition "Axis of Evil, the Secret History of Sin" at Columbia College in Chicago, and take pictures of some of the artworks, including Al Brandtner's Patriot Act, showing President Bush on a mock stamp with a revolver pointed at his head. The agents ask the artists what they intend by their work, and order the museum director to turn over their names and phone numbers. When "Axis of Evil" travels to the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, the Chancellor orders Patriot Act removed from the show.

Michigan Withdraws Funding from Ann Arbor Film Festival, April 2006: Michigan State funds for the Ann Arbor Film Festival are withdrawn because of the screening of films that the state deems "objectionable." AAFF files suit, resulting in the state legislature repealing unconstitutional restrictions on arts funding. The vague speech restrictions include a ban on funding art that contains "depictions of flag desecration" and "displays of sex acts." Additional info: NCAC: Political Control of Arts Funding in Michigan may Cripple the Arts; NCAC: ACLU Fles Arts Funding Lawsuit in Michigan; NCAC: Ann Arbor Film Festival Wins Settlement from State of Michigan on Free Speech Lawsuit; State Legislature Removes Funding Restrictions; ACLU Michigan: ACLU, Ann Arbor Film Festival File Lawsuit Against Michigan; Michigan Radio: Ten Years Ago, Accusations of Porn:Ann Arbor Film Festival Led Fight for Free Speech

2005

The House of Representatives passes a FLAG PROTECTION AMENDMENT giving Congress and state legislatures authority to outlaw the physical desecration of the American flag.

2004

2003
The Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, passed in October 2002, keeps Mickey Mouse, who made his screen debut in 1928, from entering the public domain. The law is referred to as the "Mickey Mouse Protection Act" due to Disney's central role in its passage.

The Dixie Chicks Banned From Radio Stations, March 2003: The Dixie Chicks are banned from radio stations nationwide after lead singer Natalie Maines criticizes President Bush. At a Louisiana rally, a tractor smashes Dixie Chicks CDs and other paraphernalia.

The Washington Post Pulls The Boondocks Comic Strip, October 2003: The Washington Post pulls a week's worth of The Boondock comic strips, the "Condi Needs a Man" series in which Huey and his friend Caesar create a personal ad for U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, portraying her as a "female Darth Vader type that seeks loving mate to torture."

2002
The Department of Justice purchase drapes to cover the two semi-nude art deco statues that have been in the Great Hall of the Department since the 1930s.

Artwork Depicting 9/11 Attack Removed From Armory Show, March 2002: Ennio Bertrand's interactive video Remote Stills/Under Attackis removed from the Armory Show at New York City's Pier 88 after staff members complain that the continuously-looped images of UA Flight 175 exploding into the World Trade Center are inappropriate in light of the fact that the pier had been used for months as the staging area for attack-related operations.

The U.S. Supreme Court declares the 1996 Child Pornography Prevention Act unconstitutional (April, 2002).

Sharan Paz Public Artwork is Removed from Arts Center in Queens, September 2002: City officials remove Sharon Paz's project, , 2002, in which human silhouettes falling through mid-air are pasted to the windows of the Jamaica Center for the Arts in Queens, NY. Some staff members and public officials decide the work is "insensitive."

Jill Friedman's Photographs of Peace Rally Removed from Hartford Exhibition, October 2002: The Director's Gallery in Hartford, Connecticut, removes two photographs by artist Jill Friedman from an exhibition. Hartford's director of human services calls one of the photos "un-American" and orders the removal of both photos after several employees find them offensive. The photographs document a Washington, D.C. peace rally.

Supreme Court Upholds The Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, October 2002: The U.S. Supreme Court upholds the 1998 Sonny Bono law extending copyright to 70 years after the death of the artist (for individuals), and 95 years for corporations. The Sonny Bono law is the result of strenuous lobbying by companies with lucrative copyrights. Often called (derisively) the "Mickey Mouse Protection Act" due to Disney's central role in its passage, it prevents the original Mickey, who made his screen debut in 1928, from entering the public domain in 2003. The law prevents more than 400,000 other works from entering the public domain.

Internet Provider Denies Service to Thing.net for Hosting Parody Website, December 2002: After receiving legal threats from the Dow Chemical Corporation, Internet access provider NTT/Verio declares it will terminate its contract with Thing.net for hosting a parody press release from the activist artist group, The Yes Men, on their server. The press release was posted on the anniversary of the lethal gas leak in Bhopal, India; the parody site closely resembles Dow Chemical's real site, which leads Dow to send Verio a Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) take-down complaint claiming trademark infringement. Additional info: Democracy Now: Yes Men Hoax; DOW Chemical Apologizes for Bhopal

2001

New York Mayor Guiliani Announces Formation of Decency Committee, February 2001: In response to a work by Jamaican-American artist Renée Cox exhibited at the Brooklyn Museum of Art, New York Mayor Rudolf Guiliani announces the formation of a decency committee to explore the possibilities for controlling the content of art shown in city-funded institutions. The work, Yo Mama's Last Supper, is a photographic montage consisting of five panels depicting: 11 black men, a white Judas, and a naked black woman (the artist's self-portrait), all posing in reference to Leonardo da Vinci's painting The Last Supper. Additional info: Yo Mama's Last Supper (Wikipedia)

LA Cultural Affairs Department Cancels Alex Donis Art Installation, April 2001: Claiming threats of violence, the Los Angeles City Cultural Affairs department (LACAD) cancels War, a painting installation by L.A.-based artist Alex Donis, before it opens at the Watts Towers Arts Center. The exhibition displays a series of paintings featuring fictionalized pairings of LAPD officers and gang members in same-sex dancing poses with companion text from renowned African-American poet and performance artist, Keith Antar Mason.

New Guidelines for Decency Standards on the Airwaves, June 2001: The FCC issues new guidelines indicating that innuendo and context are factors in determining whether a record violates its decency standards, regardless of the specific words. Using the new guidelines, the FCC fines two radio stations $7000 each for airing the "clean version" of Eminem's The Real Slim Shady and Sarah Jones' Your Revolution. Jones sues the FCC. Under pressure, in 2003, the FCC decides Your Revolution is not indecent.

2000
The House of Representatives passes a Flag Protection amendment giving Congress and state legislatures authority to outlaw the physical desecration of the American Flag. The Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA) goes into effect. This new law requires public and school libraries receiving federal assistance for Internet connections to install filters on all computers.
1999

Toymaker Mattel Unsuccessfully Sues Artist Over Use of Barbie, 1999: Mattel tries to sue artist Tom Forsythe for trademark and copyright infringement over his use of Barbie in his series of photographs, Food Chain Barbie. The Court finds the photographs to be a parody of everything the doll has come to stand for, qualifying them as a fair use. Additional info: Tom_Forsythe (Wikipedia); NCAC blog: Copyright, Thomas Forsythe and Mattel; TJ Center: Art On Trial: Copyright

NEA chair William J. Ivey, Withdraws Funding for Children's Mexican Folktale, 1999: Chief of the National Endowment for the Arts, William J. Ivey, withdraws funding for The Story of Colors, a Mexican folktale for children published by Cinco Puntos Press, because the book's author, Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos, is affiliated with the Zapatista movement in Mexico. Additional info: NCAC and Other National Groups Oppose Censorship of Childrens Book by the NEA

1998
The Child Online Protection Act is Passed. COPA mandates restriction of minors' access to "harmful to minors" materials commercially distributed over the World Wide Web.
1997

1996
The Communications Decency Act prohibits posting "indecent" or "patently offensive" materials in a public forum on the Internet, including web pages, newsgroups, chat rooms, or online discussion lists. The Child Pornography Prevention Act outlaws all depictions (inclusing computer simulations) of those "appearing to be" minors engaging in sexual activities.
1995
The U.S. Senate narrowly rejects a Constitutional Flag Protection Amendment.
1994

1991
Start of Gulf War One from the window of Al Rasheed Hotel, Baghdad, 1991 (Brent Sadler) The Supreme Court upholds rulings that the Flag Protection Act of 1989 is unconstitutional. A proposed Flag Protection Amendment falls short of the two-thirds approval required to amend the Constitution. Congress passes an amendment which requires that all NEA grants take into account "general standards of decency and respect of the diverse beliefs and values of the American public." Joseph Papp, director of the New York Shakespeare Festival, rejects a $50,000 NEA grant because of its requirement that grantees sign a statement that they will not produce "obscene" work.
1990
Fall of the Berlin Wall
1989
THE FLAG PROTECTION ACT, 1989: Legislation is introduced in Congress to prohibit willfully displaying the U.S. flag on the floor or ground. The U.S. Supreme Court decision in Texas v. Johnson upholds the First Amendment right to burn the flag as symbolic political speech. The Flag Protection Act takes effect. Subsequent flag desecration charges are dismissed on the grounds that the Flag Protection Act is unconstitutional.

Ayatollah Khmeini Issues Fatwa Against Author Salman Rushdie, 1989: Ayatollah Khomeini, the First Supreme Leader of Iran, issues a fatwa against British Indian novelist Salman Rushdie on charges of blasphemy for his novel The Satanic Verses on 15 February, 1989. The Ayatollah calls for the death of the book's author along with all those "involved in its publication." The U.S. Senate issues a resolution condemning Khomeini's fatwa, and declares its "commitment to protect the right of any person to write, publish, sell, buy, and read books without fear of intimidation and violence."

Dread Scott installation, What Is the Proper Way to Display a U.S. Flag? is Attacked, 1989: A student exhibition at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) is attacked for its inclusion of Dread Scott Tyler's installation, What Is the Proper Way to Display a U.S. Flag? A group led by Republican Senator Walter Dudycz, and including representatives from veterans' organizations, files a suit to close down the show. The judge dismisses the suit, reminding the court that works of art are protected under the First Amendment. State funding for SAIC is cut and many benefactors pull donations.
An addition to the NEA appropriations bill bans funds appropriated by the National Endowment for the Arts or Humanities from being used to support "materials which in the judgement of the NEA...may be considered obscene," including "depictions of sadomasochism, homoeroticism, the sexual exploitation of children, or of individuals engaged in sex acts, which, taken as a whole, do not have serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value." A federal court invalidates the amendment in 1990 as unconstitutionally vague and chilling the excercise of First Amendment rights.

Director of American Family Association Attacks Andres Serrano's Piss Christ​, 1989: Reverend Donald Wildmon, the Director of the American Family Association, attacks Andres Serrano's Piss Christ​ in a wide direct-mail campaign. In response, Senator Alphonse D'Amato denounces the work in a public statement in Congress. In a letter to acting National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Chairman Hugh Southern, signed by 23 senators, D'Amato calls for a review of NEA procedures for allocating grants to artists. The letter calls Serrano's work "shocking, abhorrent, and completely undeserving of any recognition whatsoever"; the issue, it says, is "not a question of free speech" but "a question of taxpayers' money."

AN AMENDMENT PASSED BY​ THE SENATE WOULD BAN FUNDING for the South Eastern Center for Contemporary Art in Winston-Salem, NC and the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia (ICA) for five years, in reaction to their displaying the work of Andres Serrano and Robert Mapplethorpe respectively. The amendment is eventually dropped. The NEA Budget is cut by $45,000, which equals the amount that had gone to fund Serrano and the Mapplethorpe retrospective.

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A Selective Timeline of Art Censorship from 1989 to the Present Art and culture are popular targets of censorship. NCAC's Art and Culture Censorship Timeline shows you how art and cultural censorship have evolved over time. 2019 One of Arnautoff's murals depicts George Washington

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Anno 2018 - in een geseksualiseerde wereld waar het naakte lichaam onderwerp van discussie is - zien we dagelijks geïdealiseerde, sexy en blote lichamen. Bloot wordt geassocieerd met seks en porno waarbij de intieme delen van het lichaam worden bedekt met dure slipjes en glitter bh's. Het echte lichaam van vlees en bloed lijkt ongepast om aan iedereen te laten zien. Want wanneer er een geschilderde vagina, afgesloten door haar schaamlippen, te zien is kan het publiek het mentaal nog wel aan, maar zodra het een echte vrouwelijke opening is blijkt het te choquerend te zijn.

Kunstenaar Deborah de Robertis onthult exact hetgeen dat wordt weggestopt in het beroemde werk Mirroir de l'orgine van Gustave Courbet. In Musée d'Orsay trekt zij haar schaamlippen opzij zodat onze blik wordt gevangen door, en in, haar vagina. In de documentatie van haar provocerende actie is een interessante reactie te zien; de museumbezoekers filmen en fotograferen, een vrouwelijke bewaker gaat recht voor de geopende schaamlippen staan en na enige tijd wordt er een wit scherm voorgezet. De vrouwelijke opening wordt weer weggestopt.

Een blote peuter die ongegeneerd, in ongeveer dezelfde houding als Robertis, haar Bastogne-koekje op het strand opeet roept andere reacties op. Waar het aandoenlijk is om het kleine meisje onschuldig wijdbeens te zien genieten van haar koekje, nog niet beïnvloed door de geseksualiseerde industrie en niet wetende dat deze houding een verwijt is naar sletterige gedrag, vinden andere het juist onfatsoenlijk om je kind zo rond te laten lopen. Maar is het juist niet prachtig dat het meisje zich op deze manier 'mag' en 'kan' vertonen? Is de reactie wellicht jaloezie op de ongegeneerde vrijheid die hoe ouder je bent, steeds meer wordt vervangen door de vele meningen en invloeden van de wereld om ons heen?

De sculptuur van Elisabet Stienstra neemt ook dezelfde houding als Robertis aan; een gehurkt, vrouwelijk figuur opent haar vagina waaruit goudkleurige lichtstralen komen. Dezelfde houding bereikt ook hier weer een heel andere reactie; de Virgin of Light van Elisabet Stienstra choqueert niet. Het is een verwijzing naar De Extase van Theresia van Bernini en een vermenging met religie. De gouden stralen, in beide kunstwerken, zijn het goddelijk licht waardoor het nieuwe leven op symbolische wijze wordt gekoppeld aan Gods liefde. In alle drie de gevallen wordt de naakte waarheid zichtbaar door eenzelfde vrouwelijke kwetsbaarheid te tonen, maar kleed daarmee overal iets anders uit.

Het is opvallend dat die kwetsbaarheid van het lichaam in de expositie vooral over dat van de vrouw gaat, het mannelijk naakt wordt tentoongesteld als schoonheid of de anatomie wordt zichtbaar gemaakt zoals Penis XL van Atelier van Lieshout. Het taboe rondom menstruatie wordt steeds meer doorbroken en een bloederige geboorte stond in 1973 al op de cover van het tijdschrift Ouders van Nu. Voormalig hoofdredacteur Rita Kohnstamm moest 'praten als Brugman' om de uitgeverij te overtuigen. 'Het zou lezers en adverteerders maar afschrikken, zo'n bloederige foto. Niets van waar, natuurlijk. Het verkocht uitstekend.' Maar zien we vandaag de dag dagelijks reclamespotjes over erectieproblemen op televisie? De mannelijke ongemakken blijken een minder bespreekbaar onderwerp te zijn dan van tevoren wordt gedacht. De ontketening van de man is een groter taboe dan alles wat hier in de tentoonstelling te zien.

Ieder kunstwerk op zichzelf - en vooral doordat ze zich hier samen binnen de muren van één museum bevinden - is een pleidooi voor vrijheid, 'puur natuur' en intimiteit en een reactie op de eerdergenoemde verwijdering van het schilderij van Waterhouse. In de laatste zaal wordt de persoonlijke bevrijding, ontketening, intrigerend in beeld gebracht door ontwerpbureau thonik, Krijn van Noordwijk en Mieke Mink. 'Al jaren word ik bij het wassen geholpen door Connie.' begint de 88-jarige Mieke. We horen en zien haar terwijl zij haar handen loslaat van haar rollator om zich volledig te ontkleden. De vrouw doet haar best om in balans te blijven en met alle dapperheid haar ondergoed langs haar blote huid te laten zakken. ' Maar Connie is te duur zeggen ze. Nu komt er een vreemde, en daarna, ja weer een andere vreemde' zegt ze. Het is een reclamespotje van de SP dat in 2008 voor veel ophef zorgde. Het verbeeldt hoe de thuiszorg in Nederland wordt uitgekleed doordat Mieke zich zeer kwetsbaar blootgeeft. 'Ik kan mij net zo goed voor heel Nederland uitkleden.', en dat doet ze dan ook. Het verouderde, naakte lichaam wil, net zoals de vermagerde thuiszorg, niemand zien.

De expositie BLOOT in Museum Kranenburgh (curator Thomas Widdershoven en gastcurator Marie Stel) is nog te bezoeken t/m 3 februari 2019. Klik voor meer informatie.

Deelnemende kunstenaars: Atelier Van Lieshout | Anthon Beeke | Herbert Behrens | Caspar Berger | Eva Besnyö (HU/NL) | Alexandra Bircken (DE) | Melanie Bonajo | Yi-Fei Chen (TW) | Lois Cohen en Indiana Roma Voss | Matthew Day Jackson (USA) | Michèle Degen (CH) | Rineke Dijkstra | Hans Eijkelboom | Mandy den Elzen | Kim van Erven | Alicia Framis (ES) | Lucy Glendinning (GB) | Daan van Golden | Olivier van Herpt | Bora Hong (KR) | Fleur Hulleman | Ata Kandó (HU) | Billie van Katwijk | Laetitia Ky (CI) | Duran Lantink | George Maciunas (LT) | Thomas Mailaender (FR) | MAISON the FAUX | Reineke Otten | Nam June Paik (KR) | Antje Peters (DE) | Bas Princen | Deborah de Robertis (LU) | Maria Roosen | Fernando Sánchez Castillo (ES) | Sanne Sannes | Viviane Sassen | Wim T. Schippers | Jan Schoonhoven | Yinka Shonibare (GB) | Giulia Soldati (IT) | Elisabet Stienstra | Berend Strik | Julius Thissen | thonik | Oliviero Toscani (IT) | Ulay (DE) | Ari Versluis en Ellie Uyttenbroek | Roy Villevoye | Hongjie Yang (CN) | John Berger (GB) | Wim Crouwel | Max Kisman | Hans Wolf | Butt Magazine | Easy period (CA) | Extra Extra Magazine | Fantastic Man Magazine | Glamcult | Permanent Food magazine: Maurizio Cattelan & Paola Manfrin (IT) | Suck. First European Sexpaper | The Virgin Sperm Dancer | Yoni

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Museum Kranenburgh: vijf zalen gevuld met de verwarring over onze naakte waarheid

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Anno 2018 - in een geseksualiseerde wereld waar het naakte lichaam onderwerp van discussie is - zien we dagelijks geïdealiseerde, sexy en blote lichamen. Bloot wordt geassocieerd met seks en porno waarbij de intieme delen van het lichaam worden bedekt met dure slipjes en glitter bh's.

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Александр Захаров

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Artist Deborah De Robertis flashes Paris museum goers on May 2014

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Art, China and Censorship According to Ai Weiwei

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Ai Weiwei has spent his career creating art with a direct social and political message. His photos, sculptures and installations highlight issues like Chinese censorship and corruption. Jeffrey Brown reports on Ai's artistic career and "According to What?," an exhibition of his work at the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington.

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Miriam Beerman - Van chaos naar kunst - Close Up

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Het werk van Miriam Beerman gaat vaak over menselijk leed, zoals het leed veroorzaakt door de Holocaust, dat zijn weerslag heeft op vele generaties.

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Boze kunstenaar smijt vaas Ai Weiwei stuk

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Alweer een peperdure vaas aan diggelen. Dit exemplaar, gemaakt door Ai Weiwei, werd afgelopen zondag niet per ongeluk omgestoten, maar opzettelijk stukgegooid door een bezoeker van een nieuw museum in Miami.

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The aim of this website is to provide an ever-expanding fund of information on Francis Bacon’s art and life. As of November 2017, this website now contains reference images and information on all 584 numbered works published in Francis Bacon: Catalogue Raisonné, 2016, including the exhibition history of each painting. The paintings can be viewed by decade or freely searched. At the same time as publishing Bacon’s paintings, new content has been added to the following sections: Biography; Talks, Lectures & Symposia; Studio - Reece Mews; and Family, Friends & Sitters. This site has been created and is maintained by The Estate of Francis Bacon, with the assistance of Joe Hage and HENI…

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Ann Demeester bekijkt de hypermoderne, brutale op Rembrandt geïnspireerde schilderijen van de Britse 'Sensation' kunstenaar Glenn Brown in het Rembrandthuis. Te zien t/m 23 april.

Museumdirecteuren reizen het hele land door om kijkers te wijzen op een niet te missen tentoonstelling die op dat moment ergens te zien is.

Van 27 januari tot en met 23 april 2017 is in Museum Het Rembrandthuis het werk van de hedendaagse Britse kunstenaar Glenn Brown (1966) te zien in de tentoonstelling Glenn Brown - Rembrandt: After Life. Brown staat bekend om zijn intrigerende en confronterende werk geïnspireerd op het werk van oude meesters, waaronder Rembrandt. Brown eigent zich het werk van Rembrandt en zijn tijdgenoten op een meedogenloze en brutale manier toe.

T/m 23 april te zien in Museum Het Rembrandthuis

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Ann Demeester bekijkt de hypermoderne, brutale op Rembrandt geïnspireerde schilderijen van de Britse 'Sensation' kunstenaar Glenn Brown in het Rembrandthuis. Te zien t/m 23 april. Museumdirecteuren reizen het hele land door om kijkers te wijzen op een niet te missen tentoonstelling die op dat moment ergens te zien is.

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De Kruisafneming van Peter Paul Rubens was te aanstootgevend voor Facebook. Het socialmediabedrijf verwijderde de afbeelding van het schilderij, omdat Jezus er (op zijn lendendoek na) naakt op te zien is. Rubens is niet het enige slachtoffer van censuur: Facebook verwijderde onlangs nog een afbeelding van het 30.000 jaar oude vruchtbaarheidsbeeldje de Venus van Willendorf. Maar dat het platform ook geschilderd naakt verwijdert, schoot een aantal Vlaamse musea in het verkeerde keelgat.

De musea schreven een open brief aan Facebookbaas Mark Zuckerberg, omdat ze vinden dat de ban op naaktafbeeldingen is doorgeschoten. Er werd een ludieke stunt uitgehaald in het Rubenshuis in Antwerpen: nietsvermoedende museumbezoekers werden door de 'Facebookpolitie' zorgvuldig verwijderd bij schilderijen om ze te beschermen tegen al dat gevaarlijke naakt.

' Aanstootgevend. Dat is het woord dat wordt gebruikt om de borsten, billen en cherubijnen (mytische wezens) van Peter Paul Rubens te beschrijven. Niet door ons, maar door u', schrijven de directeuren van de grote Vlaamse musea. Ze hoopten na hun open brief op een gesprek met Zuckerberg boven een kop koffie of ' een verfrissend Belgisch biertje', want ' kunst brengt mensen samen, net zoals social media doen.' Met het huidige Facebookbeleid kunnen de musea moeilijk reclame maken voor de werken van Rubens of Jan van Eyck.

De geschiedenis van het naakt in de kunst

Het afbeelden van naakten in de kunst is iets dat al eeuwen gebeurt en waar in verschillende periodes anders naar werd gekeken. Ook werd het naakt telkens anders vormgegeven: van heroïsch, via zondig, naar realistisch naakt. Het huidige beleid van Facebook is nog strenger dan de vormen van naakt in de Middeleeuwen, toen lendedoekjes de intieme lichaamsdelen moesten camoufleren!

Heroïsch naakt in de Griekse Oudheid

Hoewel er al naakten van duizenden jaren vóór de Griekse Oudheid gevonden zijn - zoals de Venus van Willendorf, gedateerd tussen 24.000 en 22.000 v. Chr. - werd het afbeelden van naakt pas in in de Griekse oudheid (850 - 31 v. Chr.) echt belangrijk in de kunst. In deze tijd werd het menselijk lichaam, vooral dat van de man, geassocieerd met triomf, roem en zelfs morele excellentie: het heroïsch naakt. De kunstenaars streefden naar perfectie, waardoor elk werk een toonbeeld werd van jeugdigheid en gezondheid. Dat het naakt hier om schoonheid ging en niet om seksualiteit blijkt uit de relatief kleine geslachtsdelen die de sculpturen kregen toebedeeld.

Naakt in dienst van het geloof in de Middeleeuwen

Met de komst van het Christendom in de Middeleeuwen (500-1400) stond de kunst in dienst van het geloof en werden naakten schaars. Geestelijken werden soms wel naakt afgebeeld als symbool van het geestelijk gezuiverde lichaam. Een voorbeeld hiervan is het lichaam van Jezus, dat aan het kruis vaak halfnaakt werd afgebeeld. Maar het afbeelden van naakt werd voornamelijk gezien als zonde en zelfs Adam en Eva die volgens de Bijbel naakt door het paradijs liepen, kregen meestal een vijgenblad aangemeten.

Godinnen en mytische figuren in de Renaissance

In de Renaissance, wat wedergeboorte betekent, werd men weer wat toleranter. Tijdens deze periode herleefde de Klassieke Oudheid en kwam ook het afbeelden van het heroïsch naakt volop terug. Om het naakt te rechtvaardigen moest men wel duidelijk maken dat het om klassiek mythische figuren ging. Veel bekende naakten komen uit deze tijd, zoals David van Michelangelo. Ook werden er in deze tijd vrouwen naakt afgebeeld, voornamelijk in de vorm van godinnen en mythologische wezens. Een ander veelvoorkomende afbeelding was die van het kindje Jezus, die naakt in de armen van zijn moeder ligt.

Rubens wulpse dames tijdens de Barok

In de periode die hierop volgde - de Barok - bleef de fascinatie met de kunst uit de Oudheid bestaan, maar vernieuwden de kunstenaars hun werkwijze. Het naakte vrouwenlichaam was niet meer weg te denken uit de kunst, zoals de wulpse dames op de schilderijen van Rubens.

Het Impressionisme met het schandaal van Olympia

In de negentiende eeuw heerst er met name in Nederland weer een strengere moraal en was er vooral belangstelling voor landschappen en stadsgezichten. Pas eind negentiende eeuw met de opkomst van het impressionisme kreeg het naakt een andere status en werd het steeds meer een op zichzelf staande kunstvorm. Manets realistische naakt in Olympia veroorzaakte in 1862 nog wel een schandaal in de Salon maar kreeg onder schilders als Degas en Toulouse-Lautrec al snel navolging. Tot die tijd waren naakten altijd geperfectioneerd en in de negentiende eeuw kregen nog veel kunstenaars kritiek op hun werk omdat zij ook 'gewone' en imperfectie mensen naakt schilderde of beeldhouwde.

Hedendaags naakt, gewoon naakt

Hoewel de invloed van de klassieke kunst afnam naarmate de eeuwen vorderde, bleef het naakt belangrijk in de moderne en hedendaagse kunst. Kunstenaars zagen steeds meer af van de klassieke academische regels en verbeelden niet alleen de geïdealiseerde goden en godinnen, maar ook de 'gewone' naakte mens. En dat komt natuurlijk nog dichter bij het naakt dat Facebook probeert te weren.

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De Kruisafneming van Peter Paul Rubens was te aanstootgevend voor Facebook. Het socialmediabedrijf verwijderde de afbeelding van het schilderij, omdat Jezus er (op zijn lendendoek na) naakt op te zien is. Rubens is niet het enige slachtoffer van censuur: Facebook verwijderde onlangs nog een afbeelding van het 30.000 jaar oude vruchtbaarheidsbeeldje de Venus van Willendorf.

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Close Up: Leonara Carrington - De vergeten surrealist - Close Up

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De Engelse Leonora Carrington zette zich als 19-jarige af tegen haar nouveau riche familie door te kiezen voor een kunstopleiding en een relatie met de surrealistische kunstenaar Max Ernst.

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Warning: Some of the content of this piece may be upsetting or offensive.
Freedom of speech is a fundamental right included in the architecture of all civilised societies. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights created in 1948 and signed by 48 members of the United Nations states: "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."

Still, freedom of speech is a contentious issue. In this period of political bipartisanship, where lines are being drawn further and further apart, the right to the freedom of speech is being played as a trump card (no pun intended) to allow people to voice beliefs that they know are going to be offensive or upsetting. And to a certain degree, they are right to do so; that is the reason that the law surrounding the freedom of speech exists.

To deal with this issue we are constantly censoring our own experience - either consciously or unconsciously - by deciding the people that we spend time with, the places that we go, who we vote for, what entertainment we consume. Peer groups are invariably drawn together by shared beliefs and experiences.

But this doesn't mean something being offensive should preclude it from being part of a conversation. Some of the most important issues politically and socially are offensive. If there were rules that forbade the discussion of offensive issues, that censored life for us, it would feel very much like the dystopian vision of 1984's 'thought police'.

You can't say that!

Censorship has always been a prickly issue. There are undeniably certain things that are inappropriate to be shared because of the audience; everyone can agree that violent or sexual imagery shouldn't be viewed by children, so it is right to censor entertainment that is likely to be viewed by youngsters.

Where censorship becomes difficult is if it infringes on the freedom of expression. If there is a documentary about marriage equality, some people would think that children should also be shielded from it, while others would think that it is essential for children to view.
J P Sears' popular satire about offence
This gray area is difficult enough when the media is something that is being specifically produced for public consumption by a television company. When the populace are the ones creating the content it gets even more difficult.

This is the situation that Facebook is currently facing. As one of the largest social media platforms in the world, it is now a microcosm of society, and as such it includes all the quirks and foibles of the world. Unlike in offline interactions however, there is a permanence to things shared on the platform - and these posts are easily shared.

This raises an interesting issue about whether censorship is appropriate on self expression, and if it is, at what point the line is drawn. To highlight this issue, let's look at one of the more shocking excerpts from Facebook's recently leaked rulebook on how it attempts to police its network, shared by The Guardian: "To snap a b***h's neck, make sure to apply all your pressure to the middle of her throat".

This post passes Facebook's guidelines as it doesn't include a direct threat, so is technically a moment of self expression. Now clearly there is a difficult line to draw as the violence included in that post is clearly disturbing, but to remove it would be censorship of personal thought, and then the conversation becomes about the value of thought versus protection from offence.

Relax, it was just a joke

Now there is an argument that the example post above could have been a joke, which further complicates the issue. Obviously, making light of violence against women in a world where the World Health Organisation estimate that: "1 in 3 (35%) women worldwide have experienced either physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence in their lifetime," could potentially propagate and normalize violence.

At the same time, humor is often used as a way to draw attention to an issue, and can be used by survivors to deal with their experiences. So would censorship of this comment be appropriate?

The answer probably lies in context. The problem is that establishing context requires time, and with 1.3 million posts being uploaded every minute, there simply isn't the time for moderators to establish context on every post that gets 'flagged' as offensive.
Facebook post from Animal Abusers Exposed, who share animal abuse images and videos to try and catch perpetrators
What makes things more difficult is that not every situation that faces censorship has a context based solution. Take images of abuse for example. In the rulebook there are clear stipulations about when images of animal and child abuse get removed and when they don't.

On first hearing this, it's difficult to think of a reason for child abuse to remain on the website, but in the files, Facebook state: "We allow "evidence" of child abuse to be shared on the site to allow for the child to be identified and rescued, but we add protections to shield the audience".

So then what happens if the child has been rescued? Does the content stop being seen of as high enough in value? What is interesting is the stipulations that are placed about when such content would be removed: "We remove imagery of child abuse if shared with sadism and celebration."

Why are you looking at that?

Clearly context is still at play here, only in the context of the posting not the context of the abuse. If someone is enjoying sharing the abuse, that's what makes it wrong. What this identifies is that there are users that enjoy sharing, and presumably viewing, abuse.

How do you then draw the line in stopping people from enjoying looking at content of abuse, even if it has been posted with good intent? Does Facebook have to make a decision about the risk versus the worth of people enjoying content they shouldn't?

Where this proves particularly tricky is how it deals with nudity. Clearly, not all nudity is porn, and if there was a blanket ban on nudity, many art pieces, anthropological images, and images of vast cultural significance would be banned.

What this does mean is that Facebook has to take a view on when nudity is of a secondary importance in the image. So a picture of a topless woman isn't acceptable, but an image of a topless woman in a concentration camp is, because of its educational importance.

According to the files, an iconic picture of the Vietnam war was removed from the site due to the fact that it featured a nude child, leading to new guidelines being drawn up.

But then the obvious question arises, where is a line drawn about what is educational? If there was a more open conversation about sex, would the previously mentioned abuse statistics be affected? Is that a conversation that Facebook should be having? And if it is having that conversation, who gives it that right?

Clearly Facebook has a burden of care for its users, if the site were a total free-for-all, the propagation of extremist groups could go unchecked leading to greater radicalization of young people, it could become a hub for all sorts of illicit and illegal activities. But should the law be the limit of Facebook's remit?

Facebook's greatest blessing is also its greatest curse, that users can find groups of like minded people all over the world. But sometimes those people arguably shouldn't be able to connect. In those situations, is it right for Facebook to intervene, or is it infringing on those user's rights by doing so?

Ultimately, these questions all feed back to a larger question: how do we decide what should and shouldn't be censored? And from that, are we comfortable with the way our world is being shaped by a company?

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Should Facebook police thought? - reflecting on the leak of its rulebook

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Warning: Some of the content of this piece may be upsetting or offensive. Freedom of speech is a fundamental right included in the architecture of all civilised societies.

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Schooltv: Censuur - Kunstenaars mogen niet alles zeggen

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Hoewel in Nederland het recht op vrije meningsuiting bestaat, komt ook hier censuur voor. Dat gebeurt niet door een openlijk verbod, maar door druk van groeperingen uit de samenleving. Als voorbeeld: theatermaker Johan Doesburg.