…and some people out there actually, kinda, sorta like us. I know, I know: it’s enough to blow your mind, huh? It’s also enough to get your artworks yanked from a student show at Utah’s Brigham Young University.
Says the artist…
Apparently the topic of homosexuality is a bit much for the BYU audience and my part of our Fine Art Classes show was taken down today. It seems that censorship is favored over support and love. This really saddens me. I found out because a friend of mine went to the show and said that my peices had been removed and the show had been rearranged.
The show was rearranged so that no one who attended would realize that the works on display had been censored for political/religious reasons. So… shhh. Don’t tell anyone.
The student artist took pictures of openly gay BYU students—openly gay and openly ballsy—and a companion portrait of a supportive friend or family member. The artist didn’t label the portraits; you don’t know who in each pair of portraits is the fearsome, terrible, ungodly gay, and who is the tragically deluded enabler of evil—excuse me, “the supporter.” You can see the pictures without the big red “censored” here. But they deserve a wider viewing—hey, maybe the Salt Lake City Weekly (“We Not All Crazy Bigots Down Here, You Know!”) could put them on its cover.
Here’s the new link:
http://jmichaelwiltbank.blogspot.com/200…
Homosexuals are gay.
Bisexuals are bi.
Straights are square.
Yet another reason i am thankful to have moved to NC from Utah (Motto: Our religion is better than yours).
Romney is already begun swooning the conservative right and plans Mormon and Christian alliance for the next election cycle. It is imperative that friends and family of gays and the gay community as a whole be prepared politically for the assault that in effect with Prop 8, has already begun.
Continued deligence and through the internet their success will prove to be what it is; bigotry, intolerance and hateful.
By the way, BYU put the photos back up. Here’s a story about it: http://www.deseretnews.com/article/1,514…
Let me get this straight, he attends an insanely conservative, mormon university and he is surprised to receive homophobic treatment??? Sorry, but you make your bed, you lie in it. Wake up and move. Leave BYU to the crazies.
That’s right, because art, once censored, is all gone. The artist never tells anybody, and nobody wants to find out what was so powerful and authority-threatening that it needed to be censored. That’s totally how art works.
@45
Thanks for sharing that. I think this project was fantastic; it has achieved what it set out to achieve. Not only did it get people talking at BYU about this issue it has, ultimately, shown that there is support, that not everyone will turn on you. I’m glad you have come to accept who you are and I hope you can also love who you are.
I’m not gay but several of my friends are and my partner is bi. This is not simply about gay people, it is about all people.
According to the story, the artwork was taken down because of a “administration miscommunication.” If this is true and the work was quickly placed back up again censorship never took place. Mistakes happen, so don’t get frustrated and see things that aren’t really there. Isn’t that the point of your artwork anyways?