A John Ascroft moment in Kew Gardens-is public sculpture doomed!

Power and its Abuses

I have lately lost faith in the power of reason. I think the time has come for those of us who call ourselves art critics to fish or cut bait.

Recently the College Art Association, to which I have belonged since the 1960s, has opted to take a pass on writing a letter of support regarding saving a public work of art by the sculptor Frederick MacMonnies, entitled Civic Virtue (something sorely needed in these times). The work crumbles in Kew Gardens, while politicians--including my democratic populist representative--exploit it as a political football to advance their own ambitions. Killing two birds with one stone, Anthony Weiner (D-Queens, Brooklyn) contends that the work is an eye sore and sexist--that the City of New York should sell it off on Craigslist rather than conserve it. His statements would be laughable were it not that he follows John Ashcroft, Pied-Piper like, in his efforts to rid the country of works of art he deems valueless. And his precedent is encouraging others in turn. [This sort of hypocrisy recalls the disingenuous cant of the Nazi party concerning decadent art during the 1930s--cut???.] In Maine, for example, the governor’s recent efforts to remove a 2007 public mural devoted to the subject of laborers represent the same self-serving politics as those of Weiner (and Queens Borough President Helen Marshall). Yet their opinions decidedly do not reflect the sentiments of the local community. Add to this the efforts to relocate Charles Alston and Hale Woodruff's murals from their public perch in an historically important Los Angeles building to the Smithsonian's Museum of African American History, and the signals are clear. Together these events underscore the fragility of an idea that we tend to take for granted: that public art is designed as "site-specific," contributes to a sense of place, and serves as an economic engine for localities that aren't necessarily in the metropolitan center.

Queens, in fact boasts only the residues of the 1939 and 1964 World’s Fairs and the MacMonnies monument as cultural artifacts. People (mostly politicians), as art historian Michele Bogart has noted, seem to believe that if they don't like the work of public art, that it should just be moved out of sight (sorry for pun) and out of mind.

Politicians knee-jerk reactions are not acceptable when they have the power to act upon them. We who have thought long and hard about art know much better, and it behooves us to stand up for what we know is right. Pastor Martin Niemöllers much-cited statement comes immediately to mind:

First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out - because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for the communists
and I did not speak out - because I was not a communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out - because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for me -
and by then there was no one left to speak out for me.

The CAA elects not to speak out against irresponsible political statements and actions (which have potentially disasterous implications for all public art) because “its members might have some considerable differences of opinion” about these works of art. In making this decision, the organization has abdicated of one of its central responsibilities as a professional arts organization. The CAA should be establishing mechanisms for members to mobilize quickly to fire back when politicians behave as did the governor of Maine, or, as was the case with Congressman Weiner, cavelierely disregard the fact that the municipality has a long-standing, charter-mandated process in place for the removal and relocation of works of art. The CAA should be looking out for the interests of its public artist members and actively supporting the idea of conserving works that have been selected for a city’s permanent collection. Civic Virtue is but one example. If we allow it to disintegrate, then any public work that fails to capture the heart of political representatives is potentially in jeopardy.

To ignore the corruption of basic values that we know to be true in both art and life is to collude in our own corruption. Niemöller’s statement affirms that we must all stay vigilant and go against the current if we hope to preserve the creative freedoms we value.