Art Of The Day Weekly

Extension of the domain of blasphemy

In France blasphemy is not a crime punished by the law, but the word today is a burning coal which the ultras see everywhere. There was a time, in the Western world at least, in which works were accused, not the human being who created it. We can all remember the Piss Christ by Andrés Serrano, which was often vandalized, or the demonstrations in 2011 against Romeo Castellucci’s play On the concept of the face of the son of God . Recent events – among them those at Charlie Hebdo of course – show that we have reached greater rigidity in each camp’s position, and intolerance has once again become a fashionable value. The destruction of the Bamyian Buddhas– guilty of representing the Divinity – remains the strongest example of religious fanaticism and artistic censureship. But iconoclasm – which reminds us of the time when Byzantine frescoes had their eyes pierced– can seethe in in a more insidious manner. The artist Orlan lambasted the organizers of “Femina” at Clichy for removing a work of art from the exhibition. Zoulikha Bouabdellah had placed a pair of high heels, a symbol of feminine temptation, on a prayer rug. As they claimed, this was surely blasphemous! As The Observer revealed, the Victoria & Albert Museum in London discreetly removed from its on-line collection a representation of the prophet. At the same time, an American official had the photograph of a pregnant woman taken out of a gallery, as the subject was considered “pornographic”… Sophia Aram, the comedian on radio France Inter, who recently presented her satirical chronicle wearing a burqa, said it clearly: while believers have a right to their freedom of praying, Atheists have a right to their freedom of thinking. Hopefully the chevalier de La Barre’s death (sentenced for blasphemy) will serve a purpose! We should take out a good slogan from May 68: it is forbidden to forbid.