retinax
Well-known
Ascribing this silly attempt at having art censored to one political side is equally silly, things like this have come from everywhere in the political spectrum. My hypothesis is that this happens because people understand art as propaganda. Understandable from people who grew up in totalitarian systems, where art was used to promote what was depicted, sad for people who grew up in freer societies.
Of course art must be allowed to deal with unpleasant topics, and historical art must be displayed for what it is. One can even display Nazi propaganda. It would be different if it was produced today. This painting as well, would probably not be bought and displayed by a museum if it had been painted just a few years ago because that's not quite the way an artist would approach this topic today, probably. Even if it was it would be ok.
Otherwise, is journalism next? No more reporting about uncomfortable topics?
Of course art must be allowed to deal with unpleasant topics, and historical art must be displayed for what it is. One can even display Nazi propaganda. It would be different if it was produced today. This painting as well, would probably not be bought and displayed by a museum if it had been painted just a few years ago because that's not quite the way an artist would approach this topic today, probably. Even if it was it would be ok.
Otherwise, is journalism next? No more reporting about uncomfortable topics?
valdas
Veteran
I guess retinax answered for me (in general - it is sad that some people treat art as "promotion" of something):
brbo
Well-known
Why not? Artists don't always focus on subjects that they find comforting.
Tompas
Wannabe Künstler
"Freedom is always the freedom of dissenters." (Rosa Luxemburg)
That's why I think banning art should always be the very last resort.
That's why I think banning art should always be the very last resort.
Baby of Macon
Well-known
Certainly in Dublin at least, you only have to walk the streets to see lots of highly "sexualised" young teenage women - all dressed by themselves and no one else. Perhaps we should burn them along with the paintings? For what it's worth I do find that the Balthus painting has a disturbing, even creepy, quality. But that's part of the function of art in my view.
daveleo
what?
There is a very personal documentary on Balthus that you may like. Can't find it right now - search IMDB.
I find Balthus' work technically, visually excellent.
But for me, some of his posing is on the edge (my personal edge) of (what's a good phrase?) sexually misusing children (?). Or "oversexualizing young girls". Primarily it's the age of his girls that is disturbing.
I am the most artistically liberal of my friends and family, and I'd be embarrased if some of them opened his book ("Balthus / Cats and Girls") and asked me to explain why I "look at stuff like this".
All of that aside, I have zero tolerance for censoring artistic expression. You don't like it? - stop looking at it.
I find Balthus' work technically, visually excellent.
But for me, some of his posing is on the edge (my personal edge) of (what's a good phrase?) sexually misusing children (?). Or "oversexualizing young girls". Primarily it's the age of his girls that is disturbing.
I am the most artistically liberal of my friends and family, and I'd be embarrased if some of them opened his book ("Balthus / Cats and Girls") and asked me to explain why I "look at stuff like this".
All of that aside, I have zero tolerance for censoring artistic expression. You don't like it? - stop looking at it.
Huss
Veteran
Huss said:
Agreed, but that doesn't give carte blanche to a pedo because it has now become art. His work shows he had no discomfort with it at all, but used that expression to make it palatable to others.
This wasn't a therapeutic outlet for him, but more hiding in plain sight.
Huss
Veteran
Agreed. I have my take on Balthus' work but it does not involve censorship. I just won't look at it.
As an aside, this hoopla has been fantastic (unintentional?) marketing for the museum. They said they are not taking it down, but now everyone is talking about it, and I'm sure a whole lot of people will now be visiting.
Peter Jennings
Well-known
Huss
Veteran
Isn’t that always the case with censorshipYou’d think people would learn.
Wasn't that how Tipper Gore 'helped' 2 Live Crew?
x-ray
Veteran
This is not new. Read up on Jock Sturges and look at his photography. At one point in his career the FBI confiscated his negs and brought charges.
Here's a paragraph from Wikipedia
"His work has been the subject of controversy in the United States. In 1990, his San Francisco studio was raided by FBI officers and his equipment seized. A grand jury subsequently declined to bring an indictment against him.[4] In 1998 unsuccessful attempts were made to have his books The Last Day of Summer and Radiant Identities classed as child pornography in the U.S. states of Arkansas and Louisiana"
My wife purchased one of his original prints in the 90's and it's beautiful art. We go through cycles. Right now a lot of people have a chip on their shoulder for whatever their cause is. A lot of people are just looking for a reason to be angry. Very sad and disturbing. What next?
Here's a paragraph from Wikipedia
"His work has been the subject of controversy in the United States. In 1990, his San Francisco studio was raided by FBI officers and his equipment seized. A grand jury subsequently declined to bring an indictment against him.[4] In 1998 unsuccessful attempts were made to have his books The Last Day of Summer and Radiant Identities classed as child pornography in the U.S. states of Arkansas and Louisiana"
My wife purchased one of his original prints in the 90's and it's beautiful art. We go through cycles. Right now a lot of people have a chip on their shoulder for whatever their cause is. A lot of people are just looking for a reason to be angry. Very sad and disturbing. What next?
charjohncarter
Veteran
x-ray, you (and your wife; see above) are completely correct. The 'recta ratio' has shifted so many times in my life I'm dizzy.
robert blu
quiet photographer
You are correct. A few of them can have good reasons to be angry. But many, too many do not. It's just a today's attitude to be very controversial. Sad!
robert
dmr
Registered Abuser
x-ray
Veteran
I learned as a kid that life isn't perfect. You learn to suck it up and move onto more important things. If you don't you're setting yourself up for an unhappy life.
EDIT:
I'm talking life in general here. Many of my friends and even my wife were clients. One of my friends, I can only deal with in small doses. He's developed the worst case of chip on the shoulder that I've ever seen. It's cost him two jobs and almost cost him a third. He doesn't do this to me because he knows he can't get away with it but he taunts people until he gets a situation going then plays victim to his boss. He's constantly looking for some imagined injustice being imposed on him. This has nearly cost him my friendship.
Why go through life looking for a reason to be angry? Is being the victim a way to get attention or is it a lever to use against others? What a miserable existence.
Another question I have and I'm just speaking in general terms, who's telling the truth and who isn't? Do you assume everyone is truthful or is there a standard to measure by? Do you assume guilt on one persons word or does there need to be had evidence of guilt? Are there consequences for not telling the truth and harming another person? How far back do you go in a persons life? What was acceptable practice thirty years ago may not be today. There's no simple answer but I do think people need to get a little thicker skin, suck it up and move on to more important things.
Lucadomi
Well-known
It probably needs to be seen within its cultural and historical context. That is why it is in a museum.
Highway 61
Revisited
I would have preferred not to post in this thread again. But - this is still totally unbelievable for me to see people here wildly confusing art and what daily happens in the streets.
Kostya : Balthus was an artist and a painter. Some of his paintings may be linked to some mental representations of some emotions related to his own mental inner self vision of what a lascive and lazy young girl could make him think of, at some point. He never was called a paedophile. Never ever. He never was caught at doing some paedophiliac things. Never ever (OK, before you write it, I know that it's not because you are not caught that you must be innocent etc, and I am aware of what happened around his Polaroids and an exhibition of his work which had to take place in Germany in 2014). He painted what came in his mind. For the painting in question : had he an in-the-flesh model ? Or did he rather just paint from memory without any model, or without asking the young model to put her leg up and display her panty ? This you don't know.
He did what Thomas Mann just did when wrote "Death in Venice", after which Luchino Visconti made a film which is considered a fantastic masterpiece (and so is the book). Did you read that book ? Have you seen the movie ? If yes, do you think that the scenes when the professor Aschenbach looks at the young Tadzio playing in his bathsuit should be removed and forbidden ? Do you think that the book (and the movie), which are built around the emotions an old and very educated man, just about to die, feels when he looks at a extraordinarily beautiful teenager, is just about paedophilia ? Come on.
Can't you just get it ? Can't you just get that there is a difference between what happens in the real life of real people and what some artists try to make us think of or consider ?
You like photography yourself. Both Irving Penn and Martine Franck (you know who they are) took great portraits of Balthus, at different moments of his life. Do you think that people like Irving Penn and Martine Franck would have portraited a paedophile ? OK, before you write it, I know that it's not because you take the portrait of someone being a paedophile that you must be aware he is that kind of person when you take the photos etc. But. Yet. Come on again.
There is absolutely nothing related to paedophilia in the Balthus' painting those people want the MET to hide or remove. Nothing.
Now let's get out of the box and put it that way : if a said-artist was to build a live performance in a modern art museum setting some paedophiliac things at stage, he/she would for sure and with good reason be arrested and enforced immediatly. Yes, with some very good and no questionable reason. Then I wouldn't have to think that we were dealing with stupid and narrow-minded people wanting to restraint the public liberties and the free expression of the artists (including some dead great artists of the past).
Second attempt : the model (if she exists) of the painting in question suddenly comes out and tells : "I got sexually abused by Balthus at some point, the circumstances were (...)". Then, some others young women having posed for Balthus come out and say something similar. Now this would be a completely different problem.
This is what happened recently for David Hamilton when former models revealed things. Problem is, that many people were aware of David Hamilton's behaviour in the 1970's already. And still, there was an omerta about that.
At the end of the day, do you get the difference between pointing real paedophiliac behaviours out then suing real people, and asking a Museum for the removal of a painting because that painting may be, from far to close in some random people minds, linked to some supposed dark thoughts of the painter ? Can you just try to, for a couple of minutes ?
Steve M.
Veteran
People have been screaming about Balthus's work for three quarters of a century. Oh well. Is his work about sexually provocative young women/girls? Yep, it is. Is it good art? Yep, it is. Art that doesn't dig into our psyche and provoke a strong response isn't art, it's kitsch.
kuuan
loves old lenses
simple and clear! thank you for that
richardHaw
junk scavenger
it's Balthus, what do they expect
they just had an exhibit of his work here in Tokyo last year i think.
if I am not mistaken, some of his works were used the cover of the Lolita novel.
in my observation, artists who do edgy stuff like this wanted their work to be provocative. if this is the case for Balthus then he succeeded in his intention this time.
thinking from a Buddhist perspective, is the art promoting pedophilia or does your mind see it as that? is it the art or the mind thinking about it.
they just had an exhibit of his work here in Tokyo last year i think.
if I am not mistaken, some of his works were used the cover of the Lolita novel.
in my observation, artists who do edgy stuff like this wanted their work to be provocative. if this is the case for Balthus then he succeeded in his intention this time.
thinking from a Buddhist perspective, is the art promoting pedophilia or does your mind see it as that? is it the art or the mind thinking about it.