Thu 16 Mar 2006
An AP wire story that prominently features the new Williams theater center (including a nice photo) is running in newspapers across the country. I recall some controversy regarding the design of this building due to the breaking up of the neo-classical theme on Main Street, but I am a big fan. It is a bit jarring, but I think a very beautiful contemporary building that serves its purpose really well. I hope Williams works hard to bring in talented students to utilize this amazing space. One of the highlights of my time at Williams was seeing a fantastic original musical written by Jason Howland (now a broadway composer) and another student collaborator (and I heard their other original campus musical was even better). Hopefully future Ephs will be treated to similar experiences by the next Sondheim, William Finn or Howland, and hopefully this facility (as well as the reputation of the Williamstown Theater Festival) will attract budding theater stars to Williams. This publicity certainly can’t hurt.
12 Responses to “Williams Arts in the News”
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Do they still have the painting with the mammy figure in it up in that building as the only piece of visual art? I remember not only finding it a somewhat unattractive piece of art, but once my eyes found the one black face in the painting that was an offensive stereotype, I could not stop staring, even as I walked away.
A little piece of blight that, for me, casts a horrible shadow over the otherwise fantastic building. I know Williams had started a conversation about what to do with the painting, but I’ve heard nothing about what’s happened since.
If it is still there and still alone, it makes that space unbelievably hostile in my opinion.
From the AP story: “…jocks [have] their plush weight rooms”
Well, not at Williams: unless they refurbished Lasell since I graduated, the jocks are still the ones without the …plushness. Crew works out in the basement of a basement. (Not that you’d hear them complain.)
Rory,
Would you be equally opposed to replacing that picture with something like “Piss Christ” or the Madonna sculpted out of elephant dung, or even (godforbid) Rockfan II: the Intellectual Circle-Jerk? Why or why not?
(the Rockfan II was intended to be tongue-in-cheek; the others were serious)
Fair question, and to be honest, I can’t be sure. I’d be irritated, but I don’t think it’d be exactly the same for a couple reasons, mostly that the mammy stereotype not only is offensive (just like the ones you point out), but that it also was and continues to be one of the stereotypical roles that black actresses are forced into taking. Thus, within the world of theater and dance, mammy strikes a chord not only because it is a racial stereotype, but also because it is a racial stereotype with an ugly history in the arts, especially theater. I don’t know that the madonna sculpture (however nasty that image is) has a similar connection to stereotypes in the arts.
Also, this particular painting has pretty much every image of a person in it wearing a mask except for the mammy. It’s also from a period in which the mammy stereotype was an accepted view of black women in the arts, whereas the madonna image or piss christ are not (I’d argue, but this is secondary to the above point) supporting and exploiting mainstream stereotypes of their times.
Rory: One of the frequent purposes and/or results of art is to annoy, irritate and offend. If everyone who is annoyed, irritated or offended, politically or otherwise, by certain art is given the right to ban the subject of his annoyance, irritation or offense, then a huge hole will be blown in worldwide art and, incidentally, speech. Of course, you have and should have the right and privilege to express your annoyance, irritation and offense, and, if it were within my control or influence, I would dutifully cause your disaffection to be ignored roundly and make decisions about the showing of the painting independent of your political views and those of others. If you don’t like this painting, don’t look at it and, if it pleases you, instruct others to do the same.
frank,
though I respect that ideal of arts purpose, I have to disagree with its oversimplified and unversalized absolutist (that’s enough adjectives, I think) ideal of free speech.
Art may be produced for such measures, and often is (if not always). Fine and good. However, creating art is separate from showing art, the context of showing art, paying for said art, etc.
Here’s where the hanging of this piece of art fails to be appropriate for its location at Williams and why I believe, though I do not wish anyone to destroy the art, it needs to either be moved or challenged by the addition of further art in dialogue with its racist imagery:
1. It is the only piece of visual art in the building. As such, it is privileged to be presented as the only appropriate form of art there. Were it to be part of a series of pieces looking at the history of art about the theater, it would be properly contextualized as a period piece. As it stands, it lacks such context.
2. It hangs at the entrance to a black box theater, a theater that is supposed to be used by students of all backgrounds. Black students are likely to feel unwelcome with that image in front of them every time they walk into the building in a way white students likely will not feel uncomfortable.
Now, let’s move away from the specifics of this hanging and why I think the absolutist view of art is flawed. Art cannot be removed from its context, message, and history.
In context, this art is completely inappropriate. In other context, it certainly might be (like, say, in a museum or gallery). Had it been recently painted, its history and message would be different. However, it was painted at the turn of the 20th century, its use of racist images cannot be problematized as subversive with its history, and its message is to silence and make Williams community members unwelcome.
Frank, is there no art you have ever thought “that is not art”? Can I write all over your house “an asshole lives here. fuck this guy”, call it art and say it was supposed to offend, annoy, and irritate you and thus is art and should not be touched and your disaffection should be roundly ignored? Is the way you would make a distinction between my absurd example and this actual painting that my complaint is somehow “political” and yours is not? How exactly is mine political? Would my example pass your test were it to be someone painting in the hallway of my sociology building “jewish sociologist should only study religion because that’s all they know”?
rory: It is not permissible for you to write anything on my house, but you can write what you like on your house, including insults directed at me. No one should have an expectation or right to be free from insult or other offense. When someone believes that he is or should be, then he’s causing himself to be set up for a fall. People are crude, rude and sometimes intentionally offensive. Life’s rough. Toughen up. N.B. You can do better with the insults. In the neighborhood of my youth I daily received many times over before breakfast better insults than the ones you just used.
Rory on one end of the Log and Uible on the other, priceless ! Keep it up.
… well, aside from Rory’s distracting and poor choice of examples (could we think a litle bit more outside the box? Do we have to egg each other’s faces all the time in blogs?) I think his points stand very well. My one point of friction would be that the statement “Black students are likely to feel unwelcome with that image in front of them every time they walk into the building in a way white students likely will not feel uncomfortable” is too hard to judge to use as a significant reason. Just say everyone will be offended. (Liberals can at least give lip service to the idea that one day race may not be the prime indicator of the contents of a person’s mind — just as liberals ask conservatives to aim for this possibility.)
For my benefit, Frank, how would you address the core of Rory’s reasoning? Especially the paragraphs starting with “1″ and ‘In context.”
Sounds as if rory thinks too hard and is out of touch with Everyman.
sorry for the poor examples. i was mostly watching the tourney while typing, to be honest :) you are right that my examples are simplistic and the one about frank’s house unduly mean (though I’m glad he can take it, i’m sorry he’s experienced worse. worst i ever got was a rock thrown through a window in high school)
Frank, you actually end up making part of my point: Williams is not your house. It is owned legalistically by the board of trustees, but more meaningfully and abstractly by the entire williams community, thusly including me and anyone else hurt by this painting. as such, i have a right to complain AND be heard about the decision by part of the ownership of the college to post something I find to be attacking another part of the ownership.
Another ‘04, I wanted to be more specific than “everyone will be offended”. My sentence was too overgeneralized about what black students will be “likely” to feel. Rather, it is reasonable to believe that some black members of the community (not just students, i’ve realized belatedly) and others will feel not just offended (I’m offended by people being flippant in response to my reasoned arguments, or by people being reasonable and serious when I want to be flippant) but actively distanced from their community. As such, I needed to use a word that may be less traditional than “offended” but got at the feeling that makes this not just bad art, but art that really should be moved/mitigated. You are right that this leads to a murky gray area, but that’s where so much of these debates are and deserve to be, imo.
As an aside, I hope to start a fund to commission a Williams alum to paint a response/reaction and present it as a gift to Williams on the stipulation that it go up next to the painting. I think that would be the best response.
’nuff said!