Amazing Artwork

Over at missourah.com I noticed a post called, "Taking camouflage to a new level." It's about Chinese artist, Liu Bolin. If you haven't seen his work it is definitely worth checking out. Without knowing anything about his pieces, you'd think the photos were just digital special effects. They aren't. Here's one example above. The man in the picture is real, but painted to camouflage him to the point of near invisibility. There is a gallery of his work at Eli Klein Fine Art.

Censoring Art that Offends Religious Sensibilities

GOP Congressional leaders successfully forced the the removal of a controversial video that was part of an art exhibit at the Smithsonian Institution's National Portrait gallery. Why? Here's Representative and soon to be House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va), who called it,

an "outrageous use of taxpayer money and an obvious attempt to offend Christians during the Christmas season."

The art in question showed"Jesus on a crucifix covered in ants." Let's imagine that the gallery hosted some art that Muslims found offensive, such as any image of Mohammed. Would the same GOP congressmen be up in arms about that? I doubt it. (Although instead there would be Democrats trying to censor it.) From what I saw in the article, I personally think the art in question is a pile of garbage. But art is highly subjective. I also oppose federal funding for the arts. But once you do provide federal funding, it's crazy to censor displays because of the tender sensibilities of religious people. That should apply to any religious group, including the Christian majority.

And is this really an issue that needs to be of concern to our congressional leaders? Don't they have anything better to do than work to prevent Christians from being offended by some exhibit in a museum? Instead of threatening to cut funding because they don't like an art display, they should cut funding because it's unnecessary and something we can do without in this budgetary environment. Here's an idea. How about if Christians don't like the art they just don't patronize the museum during that exhibit? Why do they need government involvement?

Religious people do not have a right not to be offended. And they don't need big government intervention to protect their feelings. The same GOP congressmen who will rail about big government and nanny-statism on other issues, have no problem telling an art museum what art it can display. You don't think the museum is worthy of funding because of the quality of its art exhibits? Fine. Kill the funding. But micro-managing art displays from Capitol Hill is just ridiculous, and goes directly against the principles of small government the Republican party stands for.

Spineless Bowing Before Radical Islam

The Museum of World Culture in Gothenburg, Sweden has canceled an art exhibit "featuring homosexuality in religion." Why would they do that? Apparently they feared "it might offend some believers." Hmm, I wonder which ones might be most offended, and who the museum might actually care about enough to remove a planned exhibit. What religious believers could they be talking about? According to the article, museum officials "consulted" with Jewish, Christian and Islamic representatives before making the decision. I can't remember the last time people putting up art exhibits seriously worried that Christians or Jews might be offended. In fact, there is plenty of art specifically designed to offend Christians. There's no doubt that some Christians & Jews might be offended by an exhibit featuring gay sex and passages of scripture. They might even write some nasty letters, boycott, or show up to protest at the gallery. But the UPI adds to the spineless cave-in by the museum in the face of intimidation with its own cowardly refusal to mention the real reason for the cancellation: fear of radical Islamic violence.

A quick search about the Museum of World Culture turned up this Wikipedia entry.

In February 2005 the museum decided to remove the painting "Scène d’Amour" by Louzla Darabi. The painting was part of a temporary exhibition about HIV/AIDS, and depicted a man and a woman having sexual intercourse. The artist and the curator had received numerous death threats from Muslims enraged over the Koran quotations which were featured in a corner of the painting. Some threats were telling the artist to "learn from the Netherlands", referring to the murder of van Gogh and threats against Hirsi Ali.

I'm sure the museum canceled this latest exhibit before it even opened out of fear of offending Christians and Jews.

What's Next, a Giant Bust of Hitler or Stalin?

Richmond, British Columbia has a giant 4,000 kg piece of public art described as,

the sculpture suggests grace and balance, with a tiny figure staying atop a giant head with the help of a long pole. Upon greater reflection, the face is that of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, and the balancer is a tiny, "feminized" Mao Zedong

Naturally many residents are annoyed and offended. Public art advocates on the other hand,

urge the public to see a deeper meaning in the reflective sculpture.

Here's the problem with that sort of thinking. Despite the meaning of the art, what you actually see is a giant head of Lenin. Who wants a giant head of Lenin in their town?

I'd have no problem viewing this piece of artwork in a museum, but I think it's understandable that many residents would oppose having this sculpture in a public square. The article contains a picture. See what you think.

The Brick Testament

Anyone who hasn't seen The Brick Testament should check it out. New sections have just been added.  From the "about" page on the site:

The Brick Testament is the largest, most comprehensive illustrated Bible in the world with over 3,600 illustrations that retell more than 300 stories from The Bible.

All done with Legos. Whether you are an atheist or theist, it's still an amazing piece of work.

h/t Forever in Hell