December 15, 2010 | Arts / Entertainment

Smithsonian censors gay art

The world famous Smithsonian in Washington, DC, is currently running a gay-themed, privately funded show at its National Portrait Gallery. "Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture" consists of 150 pieces of art, and was curated to explore America's artistic representation of homosexual desire. The Smithsonian's own website declared the show "the first major museum exhibition to focus on sexual difference in the making of modern American portraiture." 

The exhibit was on display for weeks with no complaints from the public. And then a right-wing reporter found out about the exhibit. And she told two friends, and they told two friends, and they all raised a stink about it. Their primary target: "A Fire in My Belly" by David Wojnarowicz, who died of AIDS in 1992.  The 13-minute video was shot in the 1980s and looks at  Wojnarowicz's  own struggle with the disease. Eleven seconds of the video shows a crucifix covered in ants.

Congressman Eric Cantor, Republican of Virginia, said the work was "an obvious attempt to offend Christians during the Christmas season." Congressman Jack Kingston (R-Georgia) called it "in-your-face perversion paid for by tax dollars."   

And so the Smithsonian pulled the video from the show, not because it agreed with the critics, but because the work "was detracting from the entirety of the exhibition." 

According to National Portrait Gallery director Martin Sullivan, the Smithsonian is just "one of the many, many players in this new discussion or debate that's going on in Congress about federal spending, the proper federal role in culture and the arts and so forth.  We don't think it's in the interest, not only of the Smithsonian but of other federally supported cultural organizations, to pick fights." 

"It was an incredibly stupid decision," countered "Hide/Seek's" co-curator Jonathan Katz.  "I am flabbergasted that they rose to the bait so readily." 

And the Association of Art Museum Directors issued a statement calling the video's removal "extremely regrettable."

The Warhol Foundation, which has donated over $400,000 to the Smithsonian over 4 years, has written to the museum and threatened to cut all future funding if the work is not returned to the exhibit. 

It was "inimical to everything the Smithsonian Institution should stand for, and everything the Andy Warhol Foundation does stand for," Joel Wachs, president of the foundation , said. "For the arts to flourish the arts must be free."

"Hide / Seek" runs to  February 13. Check out the excellent online version of the exhibit.

Smithsonian facing US funding boycott after video on sexuality 'censored' [The Guardian]

Gay Bashing at the Smithsonian [NY Times]

Repubs Force Smithsonian To Censor Gay Exhibit [AVN]