Posted on 11/19/2007 4:27:00 PM PST by ddtorquee
Britain’s contemporary artists are fêted around the world for their willingness to shock but fear is preventing them from tackling Islamic fundamentalism. Grayson Perry, the cross-dressing potter, Turner Prize winner and former Times columnist, said that he had consciously avoided commenting on radical Islam in his otherwise highly provocative body of work because of the threat of reprisals.
Perry also believes that many of his fellow visual artists have also ducked the issue, and one leading British gallery director told The Times that few major venues would be prepared to show potentially inflammatory works.
“I’ve censored myself,” Perry said at a discussion on art and politics organised by the Art Fund. “The reason I haven’t gone all out attacking Islamism in my art is because I feel real fear that someone will slit my throat.”
Perry’s highly decorated pots can sell for more than £50,000 and often feature sex, violence and childhood motifs. One work depicted a teddy bear being born from a penis as the Virgin Mary. “I’m interested in religion and I’ve made a lot of pieces about it,” he said. “With other targets you’ve got a better idea of who they are but Islamism is very amorphous. You don’t know what the threshold is. Even what seems an innocuous image might trigger off a really violent reaction so I just play safe all the time.”
(Excerpt) Read more at entertainment.timesonline.co.uk ...
I believe the English term for this is Coward.
Good little Dhimmie he is.
If the art carries a message then it isn’t art.
Not much of an artist, then.
The medium is the message (England is finished).
So much for “brave”, “controversial” artists.
It’s OK and “laudable” to insult and saterize Christians, white men, capitalists, etc., but everyone is too chicken to “offend” the Islamofascist Nazis.
It’s the new chicken art.
I guess they’re afraid of being too “cutting edge” or just afraid of the Islamofascist real, throat cutting and head loping cutting edge.
They do not want to part with their heads.
Somebody will eventually create a fictitious artist who specializes in anti-Muslim art guaranteed to make them froth at the mouth and threaten. With the publicity from the death threats to the non-existent artist, they will be able to sell the “art” at high prices to private collectors.
This kind of scam has been used for years.
That last time I heard of it, some NYC artist created some homoerotic “art” featuring Batman and Robin. He knew that DC Comics will sue *anybody* who uses Batman without permission. Then as soon as they threatened to sue him blind, he publicly destroyed “all” of his works, which killed the lawsuit. Then he had a buddy sell off a half-dozen of them to private collectors, on condition that they not tell anybody.
The whole art market is full of such con artists. They have pulled endless scams to sell their product for over a hundred years, and probably much, much longer. It just goes with the territory.
Artists, art dealers, museums, collectors, thieves, insurers, everybody involved have their own angles to rip somebody off.
Could be,,if I knew how to post a picture ,I’d show some art I’ve collected..
They don’t want their heads taken off with a dull machete.
From the horse's mouth.
There are enough mohamdedans in England to pose a credible threat.
'Epater the bourgeoisie' (to shock or insult the middle class, a clarion call since the Surrealist movement) is not the right approach.
Well crafted, respectful depictions of the big Mo's life would still inform and illuminate the ignorant. For example, a series illustrating Mo's 'marriage' to Aisha, or the murders perpetrated against the Jews in Medina.
Those events could be depicted without violating, at least technically, mohammedan proscriptions. Verses could be added as captions, and people might be made wiser.
But according to the likes of Rosie O’Donnell and Elton John, Christians are “just as dangerous” as Muslims...
Such is the “bravery” of so-called artists fighting for “the cause.”
Hypocrites.
Everywhere they go, Muslims sing, “Yakity-yak. Don’t talk back,” which they enforce against their women and would like to the rest of us.
Art was a huge organ of the 60s counter-culture. Everybody who protested, everybody who wrote and sang protest songs, everybody who wrote, directed and produced protest movies knew that they could shake their tusches in the face of the establishment and call it an expression of conscience.
However, the artists that have followed that generation obviously today fear Muslim bitch slaps and they Yakity-yak do not talk back - not to Islam.
If the 60s artists were their mentors, the truth is coming out. They weren’t about conscience. Try sex, drugs and rock and roll.
Well, here's at least one coward who's willing to admit it.
“. . .contemporary artists are fêted around the world for their willingness to shock but fear is preventing them from tackling Islamic fundamentalism. Grayson Perry, the cross-dressing potter . . .”
He thinks his “lifestyle” doesn’t already offend the ROP? He thinks he’s safe as long as he doesn’t tackle Islamic fundamentalism? Ignorance is bliss, I guess.
Yep!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.