David Pulphus’s painting in response to the Ferguson unrest, “Untitled #1”, won first place in Missouri’s 1st Congressional District in the 2016 United States Congressional Art Competition.
Each year since 1982, the Congressional Institute has sponsored a high school art competition whereby students submit artwork to their congressional representative’s office, which in turn selects a winner. The 435 winning artworks are then exhibited in Washington, DC, hung salon style in a hallway between the Capitol Building and Longworth House Office Building for a year. The office of Representative William Lacy Clay, a Democrat from St. Louis, Missouri, selected a painting by Cardinal Ritter College Prep High School senior David Pulphus in early May 2016. Early this month, the untitled painting was hung in the Capitol. A few days later, the Independent Journal Review, a right-wing website with a mixed record on factual reporting, published an article titled, “Painting of Cops as Pigs Hung Proudly in US Capitol.” A cycle of outrage began. Fox News picked up the story. In a ginned up moment, Representative Duncan Hunter, Republican from San Diego, California unscrewed the painting from the wall, delivered it to Representative Clay’s office, and went to Fox News to brag about it. Today, Representative Clay and members of the Congressional Black Caucus rehung the painting. Shortly thereafter Representative Doug Lamborn, a Republican from Colorado, removed it again, only to have Representative Clay rehang it again. Congressional Republicans are discussing how to remove it permanently.
The full story is at Hyperallergic. For people who almost never shut up about being persecuted or censored (or criticized), conservatives are always the first ones to try and censor anything they don’t like.
Talk about “thin skinned” “easily offended” and “political correctness gone mad” again.
Yeah. The short history that has piled up with this painting is near to unbelievable.
I suppose the good thing is that the publicity is inevitably going to make that painting valuable enough to pay for Pulphus’ education.
I like Hyperallergic, btw. It’s new to me, but is going to be in my regular reading rotation now.
I think the kid’s got talent. However, there are a few things that bother me.
1. I think the criticism that the painting is an incitement to violence against police has merit, in the sense that whenever you depict your foe as nonhuman, you are encouraging violence against them. Dehumanizing is almost always the first step in a campaign of violence, and we see it used against the left all the time. Before bigots want to kill someone, there is usually a full-throated dehumanization campaign. Vermin. Cockroaches. Maggots. When you use dehumanizing language against your opponents, I think you’re implicitly encouraging violence against them. Our side should be better than that. I agree that many cops have done hateful things, but we need to reform the system, not threaten them (which will just make the situation worse, anyway.)
2. What’s all this talk about censorship? Again, from our side, I’m always hearing people on FtB say that free speech does not automatically equal a guarantee of a platform — in this case, one of the highest platforms in the land, the halls of Congress. If this was in a private art gallery, or printed in a book, and they tried to ban it, then that would be censorship, and we should definitely oppose it. But it seems to me that Congress can be allowed to have a say in what is expressed in its own workspace.
brucegee
1. You’re ignoring that the “opponent” is also depicted as non-human.
2. Come on, really? Inciting violence against the police? How does it encourage violence as a solution?
From the OP:
The platform was offered by the person whose responsibility it is to do so. Unless you can demonstrate that it is normal and common for Representatives to veto and remove paintings, that Representative Clay broke any rules in selsecting this painting, this is a case where some people are trying to curtail the freedom of expression of the artist who painted it and the Representative who selected it.
Bruce:
Well no shit, Sherlock. All of that is made utterly clear in the painting. It’s about stereotypes, othering, and how some groups live up to stereotypes. You seem to have completely missed that the person the guns are aimed at is portrayed as the big, bad, black wolf. There’s also a cop to the right portrayed as a human. Like most people determined to be idiotic, you didn’t even bother looking at the painting. You see the painting in the same exact way as the bigoted cons do.
Yeah, another no shit, Sherlock. WTF? You didn’t bother to read the article, did you? Or is this just asshole day for you? Yes, congress is allowed a say, congress had that say, declared this piece one of the winners, to be on display in a specific place for one year. Bigoted asswipes keep removing the painting because they don’t like it, and yes, that’s fucking censorship. This isn’t a matter of any congress critter having the authority to fuck with the declared winners.
Put your brain in gear before you comment.
and
There are (probably) strict protocols for hanging and removing art from the walls of Government buildings.
These would not include random bozos taking down stuff they don’t like.
Hunter should be reprimanded for not following established procedure.
Don’t bureaucrats luuurve correct procedure?