Posted on 11/13/2008 7:28:37 AM PST by forkinsocket
Beirut does not feel like a conservative place. The girls wear shorts up to here and hair down to there. Cocktails are consumed by the gallon, and there is a rumbustious, if incestuous, arts scene. But this week, the limits of Lebanon's liberal attitude to art were tested by images of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of the militant Shia group Hezbollah, and a smiling Barbie doll.
Some photographs, featuring Barbie dolls and a garish Middle Eastern mishmash of political and religious iconography, were removed from a high-profile exhibition of work by the Lebanese artist Jocelyne Saab by the gallery over fears that they could “create sectarian strife”, according to Nasri N. Sayegh, the artist's spokesperson. The Sense, Icons and Sensitivity show is about what Saab calls “the other side of Orientalism”, exploring the way that the East views Western women. Saab says she sought to do this with populism and humour, with “neo pop art” images of Barbie representing the Western woman, all uncovered hair and matching accessories.
But for the Planet Discovery gallery in Beirut, pictures of Barbie cavorting wearing only Iraqi bank notes, with a crucified Ken doll, and with Christ and Nasrallah memorabilia, were too much. The gallery is part of the huge project to rebuild Beirut after the civil war. It is run by Solidere, the huge regeneration company founded by Rafik Hariri, the Prime Minister, who was assassinated in 2005. “Politics and religion are two very sensitive issues that we don't want to undermine,” a gallery representative said.
Saab, a former war reporter, who has spent the past 40 years making feature films, documentaries and images focusing on human rights, is angry. “I was offered the exhibition after the gallery had seen all the photographs,” she explains.
(Excerpt) Read more at entertainment.timesonline.co.uk ...
rumbustious.....lol....that’s so British!
O’Really will probably use that word during his little closing lecture...proving he FReeps (or has a staffer do it).
Imagine that, a gallery owner who took a stand against such antiChristian art.
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