USA: Climate change sculpture removed after upsetting donors
Does corporate sponsorships by companies like BP and Shell have an impact on artistic freedom in the UK and USA? After a controversial climate change art installation was removed from a US university campus because it upset donors from the energy industry, Kevin Smith, co-editor of Not If But When – Culture Beyond Oil, is [...]
USA: Event dedicated to those imprisoned for voicing their beliefs
An evening event in New York, ‘Thought is Free: An Evening of Protest and Solidarity’ featured high-profile champions of free expression who read the work of writers and artists imprisoned for speaking truth to power, and author Salman Rushdie in a discussion on the responsibilities of artists. The event was organised by New York’s Public [...]
USA: Library covers up controversial artwork
A piece of artwork by Kara Walker which shows a slave performing oral sex was covered after employees of the Newark Library stated they did not like the image. Kara Walker, a renowned African-American artist who examines race, gender, sexuality and violence, created the drawing. Her drawing depicts the horrors of reconstruction, 20th-century Jim Crowism [...]
USA: Art work removed from exhibition after complaints about nudity
The photo art work ‘Quotidian’ by Betsy Schneider documents the artist’s daughter growing up in a series of photographs in which the girl is nude. The work was exhibited at and then removed from the John Michael Kohler Arts Center in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, USA, in response to complaints about nudity. A coalition of artists, critics, [...]
USA: Cartoon strip about abortion law removed by newspapers
A Doonesbury cartoon strip about Texas abortion law has been removed by an increasing number of American newspapers Garry Trudeau, whose satirical cartoon strip Doonesbury has been published by hundreds of newspapers around the word for decades, met unprecedented controversy after he planned to dedicate a week’s worth of strips to a satirical look at [...]
USA: Exhibition about repression and censorship in Russia
The parallels between Soviet-era repression and Mr. Putin’s authoritarian rule are at the heart of ‘Lest We Forget: Masters of Soviet Dissent’ a new exhibition of paintings and drawings by Mr. Lapin and the late Mr. Zhdanov at Charles Krause/Reporting Fine Art gallery in Washington, USA. In May 2012, the Washington Times published an article [...]
USA: Attempt to stamp out homosexuality from cartoons
The conservative American mothers’ group One Million Moms has launched an attempt to stamp out homosexuality from the world of graphic novels. The American Family Association-run conservative Christian organisation has taken issue with the news that DC Comics is planning to reveal that one of its established characters is gay – speculation is centring around [...]
Exhibition of ‘Censorship in Art from Eden to Milwaukee’
The ACLU of Wisconsin, USA, showcases three local artists whose work has been censored or challenged in some way: Anne Kingsbury, Fahimeh Vahdat and Philip Krejcarek The “Eye of the Beholder: Censorship in Art from Eden to Milwaukee” will take place at the ACLU offices in the Marshall Building, a hub of art venues on [...]
American campus debate: Is it censorship or simply courtesy?
A confrontation over an art piece containing adult content has been seething within the Arts Building of Auraria Higher Education Center in Denver, USA, where accusations of censorship caused the controversy to boil over. According to The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, a student’s work of art on a campus cannot be prohibited if [...]
Artistic censorship denies opportunity for dialogue and growth
The mural ‘Fast Life’, created by the French street artist MTO, was whitewashed due to censorship over its perceived meaning, wrote Denise Kowal, Event Chair of Sarasota Chalk Festival in Florida, USA, who argued that this kind of artistic censorship denies an opportunity for dialogue and growth: “It was a skilled work of art that [...]
