Official Vandalism
Oct. 18th, 2015 12:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
poliphiloA judge sitting in Hammersmith has ordered the destruction of art works belonging to the artist Graham Ovenden- who has been convicted of paedophile offences. The works fingered for destruction include 19th century photographs by (or once belonging to) Pierre Louys and Wilhelm von Pluschow.
Louys is an important cultural figure, von Pluschow rather less so. Louys was a poet and novelist who received the legion d'Honneur and whose work has been set to music by Debussy and filmed by Bunuel. Von Pluschow photographed young people- mostly boys- in states of undress. Googling either of them produces a cascade of images of the kind the judge would like to see destroyed.
Stable door, horse, bolted.
So the judge's action is futile. This stuff is already in the public domain. But that's not really the point I want to make- which is this- that destroying works of art is a crappy thing to do- and even crappier when it's done by functionaries of the state. Can you think of a single act of official iconclasm- and history teems with them- which we do not now regret? Even rubbishy works of art can have a documentary value and be of use to future historians. And who's to say what is rubbishy anyway? The Nazis thought anything modernist was rubbish, ISIL thinks anything non-Islamic is rubbish.
There's a way round the problem. If you think a piece of work so obscene it should be removed from public gaze you can always lock it away. That's what the Tate has done with much of its collection of work by Ovenden (who until recently was considered respectable if a little risque)- and you can only view it if you can produce a certificate saying you're not a greasy little perve. Again, until quite recently, the Italian state locked away some of the spicier items from its collection of antiquities from Pompeii and Herculaneum- and you could only view them if you could prove you weren't a woman. I'm not exactly recommending this option- because I deplore all kinds of censorship- but it's the lesser of two evils. At least the work you've taken out of circulation still exists- and you've allowed for the possibility that later generations may view it differently.
Louys is an important cultural figure, von Pluschow rather less so. Louys was a poet and novelist who received the legion d'Honneur and whose work has been set to music by Debussy and filmed by Bunuel. Von Pluschow photographed young people- mostly boys- in states of undress. Googling either of them produces a cascade of images of the kind the judge would like to see destroyed.
Stable door, horse, bolted.
So the judge's action is futile. This stuff is already in the public domain. But that's not really the point I want to make- which is this- that destroying works of art is a crappy thing to do- and even crappier when it's done by functionaries of the state. Can you think of a single act of official iconclasm- and history teems with them- which we do not now regret? Even rubbishy works of art can have a documentary value and be of use to future historians. And who's to say what is rubbishy anyway? The Nazis thought anything modernist was rubbish, ISIL thinks anything non-Islamic is rubbish.
There's a way round the problem. If you think a piece of work so obscene it should be removed from public gaze you can always lock it away. That's what the Tate has done with much of its collection of work by Ovenden (who until recently was considered respectable if a little risque)- and you can only view it if you can produce a certificate saying you're not a greasy little perve. Again, until quite recently, the Italian state locked away some of the spicier items from its collection of antiquities from Pompeii and Herculaneum- and you could only view them if you could prove you weren't a woman. I'm not exactly recommending this option- because I deplore all kinds of censorship- but it's the lesser of two evils. At least the work you've taken out of circulation still exists- and you've allowed for the possibility that later generations may view it differently.
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no subject
Date: 2015-10-18 03:41 pm (UTC)Caravaggio, for instance. Some of his work looks very like paedophile porn- but it's old and venerable so nobody's trying to suppress it.
And those Rocky movies- as you say- they've turned into kitsch. There's no harm in them any more. At least I suppose not. I've never watched them myself. I self-censored. I knew I wasn't interested in watching Reagan-era propaganda.
no subject
Date: 2015-10-18 04:05 pm (UTC)There are also other movies which try to do the same job.
Seen with the perspective of these days, one really declares it to be kitsch - but well, I suppose, only if you know that's what Russians and that's what history are not like.
I could guess you could still have an effect on people (like Americans) which never really met a Russian, know nothing about their politics and their country and which still are indoctrinated by those stories "the Russians seek to conquer the world".
At least I notice on the American side, the thinking about the Russians still keeps on surviving.