Unsettling 'Sensation'
Unsettling 'Sensation'
Arts-Policy Lessons from the Brooklyn Museum of Art Controversy
In September 1999, Sensation, an exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum, opened its doors, igniting a controversy still burning in the art world. This collection of cutting-edge art from the Saatchi collection in England, and the museum’s arrangements with Charles Saatchi to finance the show, so offended New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani that he attempted to shut the museum down by withholding city funds that are crucially needed by that institution. Only a legal ruling prevented him from doing so. Like the Robert Mapplethorpe exhibition before it, Sensation once again raises questions about public spending for “controversial” art, but with the added dimension of religious conflict and charges of commercialization.
The contributors to this volume use the Sensation exhibition as a stepping-stone to analyze larger questions such as the authority the government has to withhold funds, various interpretations of the First Amendment, how to respect divergent cultural and religious values; and the economic stake of museums and dealers in art. In their articles—written expressly for this volume, and spanning the disciplines of law, cultural studies, public policy, and art—the contributors consider issues at the center of arts policy. They propose various legal strategies, curatorial practices, and standards of doing business intended to serve the public interest in the arts.
Representing a variety of opinions, Unsettling Sensation reveals the complexities that surround public funding for the arts and that, as David A. Strauss writes, 'the First Amendment [may be] the wrong place to look for protection if you believe that government should not withdraw funding from unconventional or unpopular art.'
Is there anything left to learn about the Brooklyn Museum's 1999 Sensation controversy, which pitted...First Amendment supporters against a demagogic mayor who never even saw the 'offensive' work in question? Surprisingly, yes, based on these 17 diverse and readable essays about the press, the law, and the public responses to the arts....The book's essays range from...discussion of the treatment of the arts in mass media to a trio of analyses of the First Amendment that amply illustrate the complexity of constitutional law.
Unsettling Sensation finally provides a nuanced account of what happened during the tug-of-war over artist Chris Ofili's painting The Holy Virgin Mary, in Brooklyn in the fall of 1999. The 21 essays respond to the controversy along a number of sightlines including the law, the public's relationship to museums, offensive images, government funding and the press.
Were Catholics offended, as was Rudy Giuliani, by Chris Ofili's The Holy Virgin Mary, a painting of a black Madonna surrounded by elephant dung and representations of genitalia? Apparently not, at least not those Catholics who attended the 1999 show at the Brooklyn Museum, according to a survey included in this wide-ranging collection of 17 essays on the issue of free speech and arts funding.
1. The Brooklyn controversy: a view from the bridge / Carol Becker
2. The marriage of art and business / Richard A. Epstein
3. The questions of free speech / Geoffrey R. Stone
4. Culture and the constitution: a guide for the perplexed / Cass R. Sunstein
5. The false promise of the first amendment / David A. Strauss
6. Reasons we shouldn't be here: things we cannot say / Stephen B. Presser
7. Who should pay (for the arts and culture), who should decide, and what difference should it make? / J. Mark Schuster
8. The subjunctive mood of art / Homi K. Bhabha
9. An all-too-predictable sensation / David A. Ross
10. Sensational or status quo: museums and public perception / Teri J. Edelstein
11. Offending images / W.J.T. Mitchell
12. The attitude of the audience for "sensation" and of the general public toward controversial works of art / David Halle, Elisabeth Tiso, and Gihong Yi
13. Shop value / John Brewer
14. "Sensation" and the ethics of funding exhibitions / James Cuno
15. Some sensational reflections / Gilbert S. Edelson
16. Don't shoot the messenger: why the art world and the press don't get along / Andr's Szàntò's
Afterword / Kimberly Rorschach
