The third group of censored artwork brings social movements or social problems to public attention. Usually, the artwork is censored by opposition groups that find the social movement or social problem morally offensive or obscene. The nineteenth-century example of censored artwork that illustrates a social movement is Egg's Past and Present (Appendix 3.1-3.3). Past and Present consists of a series of three paintings. In the first picture, the husband discovers his wife's infidelity. The second and third pictures take place years later at the same moment upon the husband's recent death. One picture shows the children alone in the home; the other picture shows their mother living under the Adelphi Terrace arches in London (Warner 106-107). The paintings “illustrate the tensions in Victorian culture between morality and sexuality” (107). Egg's “moral narrative on social issues” was successful in drawing public attention to the need to address gender roles and their consequences such as divorce (106). The dejected woman in the third picture, most likely contemplating suicide, is a result of legislation that allows a man to divorce his wife without compensation for adultery (107). Egg's Past and Present was first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1853 (Tate Gallery). While there was little direct censorship, some critics claimed it was “unhealthy” in its “misery and loathsomeness” and discouraged many viewers from seeing this controversial work (Tate Gallery). The story of this series of paintings conveys how some members of the public can convince other people that a piece of artwork is obscene.
Robert Mapplethorpe's traveling photography exhibition called The Perfect Moment (Appendix 3.4, 3.5) is a modern example of controversial artwork that brings both a social movement and a social problem to public attention. Throughout Mapplethorpe's career, he used his artwork to publicize homosexuality and the gay liberation movement which seeks to “link homosexual freedom to a larger vision of revolutionary change in all hierarchies of social, economic, and sexual power” (Meyer 159). Robert Mapplethorpe also used his artwork to increase awareness of AIDS, both inside and outside the gay community. The Perfect Moment was slated to be on exhibit at the Corcoran Gallery of Art when the director, Christina Orr-Cahall, canceled three-weeks prior to its opening (206). Her decision was a result of pressure from Republican senators, such as Senator Jesse Helms, and the American Family Association, a conservative Christian organization (206). A protest was held outside the museum on the night that Mapplethorpe's exhibition was scheduled to open, and his photographs were projected on the museum's façade near the inscription “Dedicated to Art” (207). The conservative factions of the public did not achieve their goal; in fact, the censorship of The Perfect Moment resulted in Robert Mapplethorpe's artwork becoming more widely known. Ironically, in this case, “the prohibition of homoerotic imagery serves not only to suppress but also to provoke and produce that imagery” (161). A similar event occurred when the same exhibition visited the Contemporary Art Center (CAC) in Cincinnati. The same day the exhibition opened, both the CAC and the director were indicted on obscenity charges. They were acquitted, but the case raised many questions regarding the National Endowment of the Arts' (NEA) funding of controversial artwork.
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KaleidoscopeArt Behind Closed Doors
