Thursday, June 2, 2016

Alberta art gallery takes down student’s work after complaint over nudity

A Lethbridge student's art piece is being called, by some, too controversial for elementary school students. The Lethbridge Public School Board asked the Southern Alberta Art Gallery to take the piece down after a parent complained.



A piece of art created by a Lethbridge high school student has been taken down from where it was hung at the Southern Alberta Art Gallery (SAAG) after someone filed a complaint about it. ..............​ Kimberly Tams from CBC has more.

My own 2 cents worth of comment:

Is this for real? It sounds like a bad Saturday Night Live spoof about this Alberta hick town, or maybe something one would expect to happen in ISIS controlled parts of Syria. Certainly not in a modern Western Society. That the Lethbridge School District 51 would give in to a complaint by a obviously uncultured prude is astonishing; laughable if it were not such a sad reflection on what misunderstood 'political correctness' has come to dictate, forcing the moral position of one onto the general public. What next? This piece is a brillant collage by this grade 12 student, a tribute to historical art. Next would be banning any depictions of Michelangelo's work found in places such as the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican. Good enough for the pope, but oh, not suitable for the morals of prudish Lethbridge. And again, Southern Alberta's Lethbridge makes it self the laughing stock of Canada and the world! Way to go!

Pictured is a familiar piece, the Birth of Venus by Sandro Boticelli.

But it appears this made the rounds already, here is a write-up in Metro News:

A student's work has been deemed too racy for a Lethbridge school board's elementary school children after parent complaints.
The classic art remix, a collage of works including the Birth of Venus, has been whisked away to a private viewing room.  
All of the schools in Lethbridge participate in an arts program to submit student work chosen by teachers to the Southern Alberta Art Galley (SAAG) – it’s called Art’s Alive.
The works range from kindergarten-aged children to students in Grade 12.
On Wednesday of last week the Lethbridge School District No. 51 took down a Grade 12 student's work after a parent, or several parents, complained “about the content of the work.”

...... read more

by  Helen Pike Metro News

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UPDATE:

I had posted the original CBC article on Facebook. One comment I found particularly fitting was by a Portuguese artist friend:
Crazyness! I would call it the "Fig Leaf syndrome". I recall the Michelangelo's David episode... but that happened in the Victorian era . Nowadays, people with such psychological disorders would make better use of their time getting adequate therapy instead of spending time in galleries. Just sayin'...

Now here is another one:
I can't avoid being shocked by the recurrent news about artwork being banned for nudity from galleries and museums. It always provides me an involuntary travel in time - but no thanks, my eyes are on the opposite direction!
-Is the artwork so empty of art that it can only activate particular parts of the viewer's brain?
- Does the viewer own a real brain, with real nervous tissue and all?
Now, seriously, worldwide perverts, blind spirits and narrow-minded religious freaks, get a life... and especially a good psychotherapist!! The rest of the world says "Ah! Good for you! Was about time!".
"What spirit is so empty and blind, that it cannot recognize the fact that the foot is more noble than the shoe, and skin more beautiful that the garment with which it is clothed?" (Michelangelo)
Yeah! Back to the 15th century, what a cool guy Michelangelo was. Some centuries later, yeah, the question remains urgent:
What spirit?

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