Protests against Dana Schutz painting of Emmett Till

[Kentonio]

White Artist’s Painting of Emmett Till at Whitney Biennial Draws Protests

The open-coffin photographs of the mutilated body of Emmett Till, the teenager who was lynched by two white men in Mississippi in 1955, served as a catalyst for the civil rights movement and have remained an open wound in American society since they were first published in Jet magazine and The Chicago Defender at the urging of Till’s mother.

The images’ continuing power, more than 60 years later, to speak about race and violence is being demonstrated once again in protests that have arisen online and at the newly opened Whitney Biennial over the decision of a white artist, Dana Schutz, to make a painting based on the photographs.

An African-American artist, Parker Bright, has conducted peaceful protests in front of the painting since Friday, positioning himself, sometimes with a few other protesters, in front of the work to partly block its view. He has engaged museum visitors in discussions about the painting while wearing a T-shirt with the words “Black Death Spectacle” on the back. Another protester, Hannah Black, a British-born black artist and writer working in Berlin, has written a letter to the biennial’s curators, Mia Locks and Christopher Y. Lew, urging that the painting be not only removed from the show but also destroyed.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/21/arts/design/painting-of-emmett-till-at-whitney-biennial-draws-protests.html?emc=edit_th_20170322&nl=todaysheadlines&nlid=33386653&_r=0

I have a real issue with this. Firstly surely the whole point of art is that the message comes from the creation not from the creator. If this had been a painting by an African American artist, no protest would have occured, its purely based on the ethnicity of the artist. Secondly, even if people had an issue with where the painting was being displayed, or it being included in a particular event, the idea of calling for art to be destroyed just repulses me. It's no different than calling for a book to be burned in my mind.

Am I missing something?

[ExciteBike66]

1. You're not missing anything, methinks.

Calls to destroy this piece of art are disgusting.

[Demsrule86]

2. Art?

Disrespectful...in my opinion.sure she has the right maybe but that doesn't mean she should do it.

[Kentonio]

3. Why shouldn't she do it?

And why is it disrespectful? She's a mother empathizing with the loss of another, and respecting the bravery of Mamie Till who insisted on the casket being open at the funeral. Why should she be required to be African American to feel that empathy or reference that subject matter?

[ExciteBike66]

4. And "Piss Christ"? nt

[Warren DeMontague]

7. Unless there's something I'm missing about the painting itself, I dont see the disrespect angle

i mean, was Picasso actually in Guernica while it was being bombed? No. He painted it as a statement about an atrocity.

[Arkansas Granny]

14. I don't see it as disrespectful. As another poster has already pointed out, Mamie Till insisted

that the world see what racism and hatred had done to her son. This is a message that is as important today as it was in 1955. The message is what's important, not the race of the artist.

[Warren DeMontague]

5. By that logic, Christians shouldnt make movies about the Holocaust.

[whathehell]

18. Correct..

[get the red out]

6. JMO

I think it was poor judgement for a white artist to choose this as a project. I am not saying it should be destroyed, or that she doesn't have the right.

I am white, so I am sure I am posting from a complete lack of understanding, but it seems to me that a white person expressing the intense wounds others have endured from despicable racism is not the best thing to do.

[grossproffit]

8. Artistic expression has no race. Don't like it, don't view it.

[Demsrule86]

9. You are probably right but it seems exploitative to me.

I would not like to see my loved in a coffin...and it causes racial division as well at a time we don't need that. As I said she has the right to paint anything she wants...but should she? I will not see it. I would not support this sort of thing.

[Warren DeMontague]

10. She should respect the wishes of his family, first and foremost.

But I would say that no matter the race of the artist.

[Kentonio]

12. How is it exploitative?

Till's mother specifically demanded that the real coffin by open so that the world could see the terrible crime that had been committed. Even all these years later the pictures are a deeply powerful and disturbing reminder of the sickness in society that was allowed to exist. I'm not sure how suddenly a painting suddenly becomes divisive in that context.

[Demsrule86]

16. That was her choice... the mothers...I just don't

think it is respectful to the family to use their loved on in this way...to make money. Some things should just not be done...but the artist has what she wants and will no doubt make a good deal of money. Do you think maybe a KKK type will buy the painting...to remember 'the good old days'.

[Kentonio]

17. No-one will buy it.

The artist already said she has no intention of selling it.

[whathehell]

19. It's an abstract painting..

To most, it's not even recognizable as to subject matter. Most abstract painters (as opposed to commercial painters) are not "in it for the money". They'd starve if they were.

[Ligyron]

15. IDK about exploitative myself.

She's apparently in demand as an artist and has no problem selling her paintings.

[trc]

11. Who took the original photos of Emmit Till in his coffin?

Does the power those pictures possess and the feelings they bring forth diminish if the original photographer was white? Are they more intense, more personal, more real if the photographer was black? Is there no commonality to the human experience that we can all feel horror at what is truly horrible?

[still_one]

13. Is what happened to Emmett Till, and the racism that exists in America, being overshadowed by this?

[whathehell]

20. I would really doubt that. n/t