Visual Art Aug 3, 2011 at 4:00 am

A Revolution at Tacoma Art Museum

Comments

1
Side note: When Katz pitched "Art, AIDS, America" to one unnamed American museum, the director told him, "This is wartime. It's too much of a downer."
2
Good for TAM -- the show was great and I wish I would have had a chance to see it. I saw David Wojnarowicz's video piece when the University of Chicago art museum screened it this spring, and I thought it was very critical of the Catholic Church for its stance on AIDS. It wasn't anti-Catholic in a "all Catholics take their marching orders from the Pope" kind of way, but Wojnarowicz associated a lot of violent imagery (the ants were the least of it!) with the Church. It was a searing critique, and one that I consider justified, considering the Church's history regarding people with AIDS. Bearing this in mind, it doesn't seem correct to brush aside the accusation that Wojnarowicz's piece was anti-Catholic when it was certainly neither reverent nor complimentary toward the Church.
3
Thank you for what i hope is a scare big enough for me to do something about.
4
@2: What about the entire history of violent religious art? Is all of it a critique of the church? Which part of this seemed directed specifically at the church? I've seen several versions of Wojnarowicz's video, and none of them to me seemed to be about the church. Rather, they use religious imagery to tap into the cruelty of turning a blind eye to suffering. Wojnarowicz would have expected the church to socially crucify gay men; it seems to me his greater mortification was with the widespread cruelty of mainstream American society in general in the 1980s, and in particular the American government.
5
The protest is already starting ... some calls, letters to the News Tribune and some conservative docents quitting.
6
Also, "PORTRAIT OF HIS DEAD BOYFRIEND" was a part of the "Marsden Hartley: American Modern" show in 2005.
7
@2, Were do you get this from and why have you not answered back to @4? It would be interesting to hear what you have to say in response. Do you have your own particular issues with the Catholic Church? I have to agree with Jen that Wojnarowicz seems to have had a larger view of the problems in the world existing for gays than just Catholicism. And as a good artist his messages seem nuanced and complex. Wojnarowicz, when looking at his work at large, is clearly not focusing on the Catholic Church as the center of what he was at war with. The Church and his supposedly abusive father where just a small part of a larger vision here.

Apparently Wojnarowicz had ants crawling over many things in his works. I recall a conference at the Henry when so many of the participants were so proud that they were describing Wojnarowicz’s works meaning centered in religious iconography. I took exception to this believing that his world was larger and it seemed too simple to pigeonhole him as simply at war with the church. Wojnarowicz felt assaulted by institutions and cultures that failed to humanize the victims of AIDS. I presume he was quite use to the general problems of being gay in America. The following reference might help:

http://www.artinamericamagazine.com/revi…

8
well written, good information, but good lord i kept dosing off,,
9
When you go (or even if you don't), please drop a note to the staff at the TAM letting them know you support the show. They have been getting a lot of bad attention from bigots for this and the least we can do is show them their efforts are appreciated.

Please wait...

and remember to be decent to everyone
all of the time.

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