A very wise man told me when I was much younger than I am now, "Never assume you have suffered more than someone else because actually, you don't know that." ONe task of the artist is to imagine their way into the experiences of others. Everyone is somewhat blinkered. - though by different things - about what they can see & artists help us take those blinkers off. Forbidding white people from efforts to engage with these subjects is simply a good way to encourage both white ignorance & white passivity. Unless artists & the rest of us are free to try, we cannot have the conversations that we need to have in this country. Any effort - no matter how halting or flawed - is a good thing. It takes nothing from anyone.
19
The article got me to look up Emmett Till online and read about him.
So indirectly, the painting is doing a good thing - raising awareness.
So indirectly, the painting is doing a good thing - raising awareness.
22
As a black man I'm always sensitive to concerns of racial and cultural appropriation - legitimate issues, considering white America's history of hijacking, co-opting and/or de-legitimizing the art and narrative of its African American citizens.
The recent death of Chuck Berry is a painful reminder of this fact; his true place as rock 'n roll's king never accepted, with his epoch changing role relegated to that of a line cook in many a eulogy. Beyonce's grammy snub, and the Moonlight oscar snafu as perfect allegorical example of black art's struggle for self-control and legitimacy.
Everyone is entitled to their opinion. However, I'm disturbed when anyone, especially a fellow "artist" calls for a piece of art to be removed or destroyed. It's fascism period.
I understand the weariness of the "white saviour" that many rightfully have but to say that a fellow human cannot or should not express the tragedy or suffering of a group they supposedly are not a part of "because they could never understand", I find patronizing, condescending, and a certain type of bullying in its own right.
The recent death of Chuck Berry is a painful reminder of this fact; his true place as rock 'n roll's king never accepted, with his epoch changing role relegated to that of a line cook in many a eulogy. Beyonce's grammy snub, and the Moonlight oscar snafu as perfect allegorical example of black art's struggle for self-control and legitimacy.
Everyone is entitled to their opinion. However, I'm disturbed when anyone, especially a fellow "artist" calls for a piece of art to be removed or destroyed. It's fascism period.
I understand the weariness of the "white saviour" that many rightfully have but to say that a fellow human cannot or should not express the tragedy or suffering of a group they supposedly are not a part of "because they could never understand", I find patronizing, condescending, and a certain type of bullying in its own right.
33
I happen to find Ms. Schutz's painting very powerful, beside which the racial identity of the painter seems of secondary interest. Who is going to decide what subject matter my be depicted by which artists? That's the exact opposite of freedom of expression. I wouldn't want to live in a society like that.
23
No, a particular, self-defined, 'race'-based 'community' does not possess aesthetic property over the death of any of its members. Or to it in blunt, personal terms that 9-th grade amerika likes to hear: blacks are not entitled to either tell me how to feel about any particular death or to direct my aesthetic representation of said feelings.
To claim otherwise violates the basic statements of Human Rights which enabled the civil rights movement in the first place. In other words, the 'black' argument is so hopelessly weak as to be infantile. Or better said, 'amerikan'.
To claim otherwise violates the basic statements of Human Rights which enabled the civil rights movement in the first place. In other words, the 'black' argument is so hopelessly weak as to be infantile. Or better said, 'amerikan'.
12
Biproduct of art: parochial tribalism.
4
I taught at a mixed race school where there was a racist incident. I tried to find a solution. The black students protested and shut down the school. I thought a righting of the wrong was best. The kids chose to make a statement instead. The kids who were wronged owned their solution. A white teacher who intervened and who didn't and couldn't share their perspective had nothing worthwhile to say.
2
At what point does legitimate criticism of cultural appropriation end and unwarranted attacks on freedom of expression and rejection of our common humanity begin?
Is this painting an example of a white person misappropriating African-American culture, or is it an example of a white person attempting to come to terms with his own culture's history of oppression and racism?
Misappropriation of African-American culture by white people is just a continuation of centuries old oppression. But the image of Emmett Till is not owned by African-American culture alone. It is part of white culture too, because of what white people, what the ugly side of white culture, did to him. It is that truth that white people so often refuse to acknowledge, and it is that refusal that perpetuates white racism and oppresssion.
But if we can embrace the truth that our people and our cultures are inextricably linked by shared history and experience, if we can acknowledge that we are more alike than different in our humanity, that we need to respect and love each other, need to work together to thrive- then, finally, we will be able to acknowledge the past, and begin the journey towards a future of reconciliation and freedom.
Is this painting an example of a white person misappropriating African-American culture, or is it an example of a white person attempting to come to terms with his own culture's history of oppression and racism?
Misappropriation of African-American culture by white people is just a continuation of centuries old oppression. But the image of Emmett Till is not owned by African-American culture alone. It is part of white culture too, because of what white people, what the ugly side of white culture, did to him. It is that truth that white people so often refuse to acknowledge, and it is that refusal that perpetuates white racism and oppresssion.
But if we can embrace the truth that our people and our cultures are inextricably linked by shared history and experience, if we can acknowledge that we are more alike than different in our humanity, that we need to respect and love each other, need to work together to thrive- then, finally, we will be able to acknowledge the past, and begin the journey towards a future of reconciliation and freedom.
11
I listened to two Black ministers on Boston Public Radio yesterday express their outrage against this painting, the artist and the museum. Really people..this isn't a racial issue. Perhaps the style isn't one which some can appreciate. I, personally, found this painting quite powerful. I lived through those dark times when Emmet Till was killed. Perhaps a white person cannot speak the same artistic perception of a Black person's history. But art is art. It is supposed to make an impression. It often is supposed to invoke outrage. It makes us think. How many people would again be talking about the horror of those dark days in American history that took Emmet Till's life if there were not reminders? I am glad that this issue reached the NYT pages and the vast numbers of its readers. It reminds us of the blight of racism in our country. It reminds us that racism is not dead. It reminds us that the parents of every young Black man has to hear the conversation about how he appears in public and how to act if approached by police. It reminds us of White Privilege and that until we reach across racial divides and the communication goes both ways, the wounds cannot be healed. Our blood is all red. Pain is felt in the same parts of our hearts. Perhaps our compassion is all one color as well.
8
The painting may stink, but the race of the artist is a non issue.
Unless, of course, you're a racist.
Then it's the only issue.
Unless, of course, you're a racist.
Then it's the only issue.
8
What an inspiring example Mamie Till-Mobley set. If any lives matter, the lives of moms of desecrated lives do.
My thoughts also go to another artist, and to his mother: Katherine Jackson. Her son, as happens to so many black lives, was brutally killed more than once. First when he was falsely accused, and condemned by a large swath of public opinion, of/for child abuse.
Michael Jackson showed his beautiful heart not only in tender soulful song but also in bringing his huge wealth to use in charity for children. Thus he came into contact with many more children as certain members of the catholic clergy who ended up with hundreds of people seeking justice for abuse. With Michael there have been till now 4 accusers, failing to convince court or jury with credibility.
The industry that preyed upon the opportunity to cheaply wrestle the rights of the Beatles catalogue from him, was the only party involved that profited from his show trials.
Later Michael was driven over the cliff of life by the relentless profit greed of same industry.
I know experiencing someone testifiy visibly shaken she saw in a dream the name and the face of the man in the shadows ordering MJ's killing, who then googled exactly that face to belong to that name unknown to her before as a higher rank in the music industry, don't count for anything.
But I also know Michael deserves to be vindicated.
http://www.truemichaeljackson.com/drawing/photogallerycbm_117332/36/#mic...
My thoughts also go to another artist, and to his mother: Katherine Jackson. Her son, as happens to so many black lives, was brutally killed more than once. First when he was falsely accused, and condemned by a large swath of public opinion, of/for child abuse.
Michael Jackson showed his beautiful heart not only in tender soulful song but also in bringing his huge wealth to use in charity for children. Thus he came into contact with many more children as certain members of the catholic clergy who ended up with hundreds of people seeking justice for abuse. With Michael there have been till now 4 accusers, failing to convince court or jury with credibility.
The industry that preyed upon the opportunity to cheaply wrestle the rights of the Beatles catalogue from him, was the only party involved that profited from his show trials.
Later Michael was driven over the cliff of life by the relentless profit greed of same industry.
I know experiencing someone testifiy visibly shaken she saw in a dream the name and the face of the man in the shadows ordering MJ's killing, who then googled exactly that face to belong to that name unknown to her before as a higher rank in the music industry, don't count for anything.
But I also know Michael deserves to be vindicated.
http://www.truemichaeljackson.com/drawing/photogallerycbm_117332/36/#mic...
1
So a German can't paint a picture of the holocaust? A Jew can't paint a picture of the Crucifixion? Art is expression. Expression doesn't appropriate (whatever). The fact that the assertion is made that this work "appropriates" this or that signifies that the art work triggered a mental/emotional response. Get over yourself.
Long story short; art doesn't care about your race or perceived social constructs of 'privilege,' "Apartheid," etc. any more than it cares about perceived blasphemy, hate speech, etc. Does the artist? Maybe. Maybe not. But art is free speech executed by the artist, and doesn't require an explanation, much less some perceived racial credentials for artistic license.
Long story short; art doesn't care about your race or perceived social constructs of 'privilege,' "Apartheid," etc. any more than it cares about perceived blasphemy, hate speech, etc. Does the artist? Maybe. Maybe not. But art is free speech executed by the artist, and doesn't require an explanation, much less some perceived racial credentials for artistic license.
10
The sacred and the profane have been fighting, rather uselessly, over the soul of art since art first began. There are no clean lines, there are only objects that pass endlessly back and forth between judgement. And that chasm that exists between black and white culture is one that will, equally, never be remedied. No white person, no matter how shabbily they are treated, can honestly claim to know what it feels like to be black, to be utterly defined within a context that seems endless and oppressive. And so our empathy will always be incomplete, our perspective always out-of-focus. We can never know what it feels like to be black, we can never replicate it, only approximate it. And so, it will always feel alien and abstract to those for whom the experience is anything but. In stark, black-and-white realism or garish, abstract color, Emmett Till's life and death can't be anything to me other than a broad human tragedy, it can never be personal. The sacred, personal and the profane, universal can never inhabit the same space. But art has room enough for both. Art is perspective, even the one standing on the other side of a divide it cannot cross.
2
the only issue with this painting is that its bad art. objections of so-called appropriation of subject matter are themselves inappropriate attempts to dictate the boundaries of thought and expression. there is to me a big difference between rightly preventing the award of the trappings of respectability to a scoundrel like Charles Murray and wrongly claiming that whole areas of expression are off limits to some people.
1
The best thing I've read is the (fortuitously named) Gary Indian's "Affidavit" article on the "cretinizing" effect of this controversy. He nails the work itself "Schutz’s painting is a rather blowsy, abstract rendering of Emmett Till’s body in its open coffin, ..." with some due deferece to the white artist's and some astute castigationa of Hannah Black's motives. What's missing is just how this form of semi-representational graffiti that's a la mode in today's galleries (call it "Cartoonism") puts an infantile prefabbed emoji on anything and everything it depicts - regardless. The painting shouldn't have been painted because nothing it does is worth doing, in juxtaposition with the original, indelible shocking photograph.
4
I think there is a case to be made for removing the painting, or at least admitting that it should not have been put up in the first place. One can argue that it simply is not good art. Good art uses the aesthetic form to deepen our understanding of an issue. It does not rely on pre-given external sources of meaning for its own aesthetic value. It is arguable that "open casket" simply trades on the significance of the original photo for its own meaning, but does not contribute anything to our understanding of the original photo. This might be in part what is behind the protests.
2
Nobody tells me what I can or cannot paint.
16
For the record, the name of the Bob Dylan song referred to in the article is "The Death of Emmett Till", not "The Ballad of Emmett Till".
But I thank Mr. Benson for his thoughtful piece.
But I thank Mr. Benson for his thoughtful piece.
7
Censorship of this painting reminds me of the vitriolic criticism Alice Randall received for The Wind Done Gone. How dare a black woman parody a white icon!
Dana Schutz has the same artistic right of expression as Alice Randall.
Dana Schutz has the same artistic right of expression as Alice Randall.
5
What artists paint (draw, create) is their own business. Whether or not it's well-done or at our level of relevance is ours.
I sure hate that people would try to "silence" the artist's right to this type of speech by advocating destroying a work that doesn't meet their expectations and definitions. Why not ask your local news media to stop running upsetting stories? Or stories you think only you and your personally-defined ilk "own" the right to tell? Should a retraction be run or a reporter fired for running material you find too sensitive?
For the nouveau "owners" who likely weren't even around for the Till tragedy, sorry but you're out of line on this one.
I sure hate that people would try to "silence" the artist's right to this type of speech by advocating destroying a work that doesn't meet their expectations and definitions. Why not ask your local news media to stop running upsetting stories? Or stories you think only you and your personally-defined ilk "own" the right to tell? Should a retraction be run or a reporter fired for running material you find too sensitive?
For the nouveau "owners" who likely weren't even around for the Till tragedy, sorry but you're out of line on this one.
10
Sorry, PC police. It's art, you can't regulate the product or the creator.
8
I get the painting as an expression of an anguish and outrage similar to what I feel every time I hear again about Emmet Till and Tamir Rice and all the others -- and separately, the thugs who have killed them with impunity.
My son-in-law's big brother/musicianship-supporter was found shot at Christmas, having lain dead for a week. Each year I brought a Jewish grieving candle to Christmas to commemorate his life and acknowledge all of our, but mostly my son-in-law's, grief. My son-in-law protested, as if I had no right. I finally emphasized 'You are not the only one affected!'
I feel that way about the protest against (good grief) a 'white person's' art about a black murder.
She has a right. An ineffably senseless loss affects us all. Or when, 'at long last', are we all human?
My son-in-law's big brother/musicianship-supporter was found shot at Christmas, having lain dead for a week. Each year I brought a Jewish grieving candle to Christmas to commemorate his life and acknowledge all of our, but mostly my son-in-law's, grief. My son-in-law protested, as if I had no right. I finally emphasized 'You are not the only one affected!'
I feel that way about the protest against (good grief) a 'white person's' art about a black murder.
She has a right. An ineffably senseless loss affects us all. Or when, 'at long last', are we all human?
7
The cataclysmic catastrophe of white female accusation of the Black male menace,is legendary.From the Scottsboro boys to Susan Smith to the Stuart case in Boston,the 'eternal suspect, of Black male masculinity,has haunted the front pages of many sensationalized spectacles.The genteel lily white sanctity of the American white female,is really the impetus of much contemporary racism.We've noticed nuanced television ads with Black female/white male,couples,but a significant minority of white female/black male,couples.The unspoken significance is ghostly and glaring;American white males are worthy of Black female companionship,but the opposite,is definitely untrue,African American males are unworthy of white female association(s).One assumes this 'message must be a conscious depiction as a televised commercial is a considerable and complex affair.The 'message,is the essence of the presentation.The picture of the white females gazing at Mr.Till is almost affronting...Why are there No African Americans at the 'show?...What's Goin' On?
Just because a white guy painted it, a lot more people are exposed to this painting and the event behind it. Maybe being able to have empathy for other cultures is a good thing, at least here. Just because some white guy painted it doesnt mean that its some sort of atrocity. Jeesh. You know if we keep this up then there will be no more fiction, only autobiography.
Why is this all so familiar?
Right. In 1969 "the exhibition "Harlem on my Mind" opened at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the first attempt to include the African American experience in the mainstream narrative of Kulcha. Immediately the White power structure found a handful of African Americans (artists and community "leaders") to oppose the show, thereby ensuring that the experience would not be shared (as it was, enthusiastically, when I visited the Met back then), but rather, that the right to narrate that experience would be delegated by the White power structure to the "appropriate" representatives.
To paraphrase an insight of Chip Gates, in Mainstream America a single African American artist who protests against a particular painting is not a single artist protesting, he or she must be made into a representative of "What all those people think."
Paul Werner
Author, "Jump Jim Corot. Cash, class and Culture at the Metropolitan Museum of Art."
Right. In 1969 "the exhibition "Harlem on my Mind" opened at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the first attempt to include the African American experience in the mainstream narrative of Kulcha. Immediately the White power structure found a handful of African Americans (artists and community "leaders") to oppose the show, thereby ensuring that the experience would not be shared (as it was, enthusiastically, when I visited the Met back then), but rather, that the right to narrate that experience would be delegated by the White power structure to the "appropriate" representatives.
To paraphrase an insight of Chip Gates, in Mainstream America a single African American artist who protests against a particular painting is not a single artist protesting, he or she must be made into a representative of "What all those people think."
Paul Werner
Author, "Jump Jim Corot. Cash, class and Culture at the Metropolitan Museum of Art."
2
When I read the original article about this controversy, I thought not only about the right of the artist to express in her medium her reaction to the event and its context, but the careers of my husband and I: He was a school social worker in a predominantly black community --and a beloved one -- and I taught students of many different backgrounds and cultures. I do not feel that only teachers of the same background can teach and relate to students. In fact, I observed some black teachers who had low expectations of black students. Let us continue the dialogue and the work to get rid of the artificial concept of race. That does not mean that we must give up the positive aspects of our cultural or ethnic backgrounds, but be willing to share them with those who are different.
4
The problem with an article like this, one that seeks to encourage meaningful dialogue, is that when the author's examination of the debate's clashing perspectives is so exquisitely executed, it can render any further conversation or competing opinion on the subject irrelevant. Here, that 'anxiety of influence' is compounded by an 'anxiety of authority', given the author's singular expertise on this subject & insight into how Ms. Mobley related to works of art about Emmett. I'm grateful the Times sought out Mr. Benson. This is by far the most astute & substantive response to the haunting questions raised by the display of "Open Casket".
But I'm also glad that his piece comes after several days of protests (perhaps intentionally on Benson's part). In the intervening days I read dozens of different reactions to the work & its protesters. Outrage makes you invested.
I was exposed to artists, ideas & wildly diverse angles of critique I wouldn't have otherwise encountered. I had raw, reflective conversations with friends offended by the painting. Where we were forced to genuinely reckon with what if means for a person to be simultaneously right & wrong. That connection is a bridge. It will remain long after the painting is taken down.
If this article was published earlier, Mr. Benson's authority may have suffocated some of that vigorous debate. I'd be lying if I did not say that, in a way, I find it to be the final word on this controversy. Though surely not its theme.
But I'm also glad that his piece comes after several days of protests (perhaps intentionally on Benson's part). In the intervening days I read dozens of different reactions to the work & its protesters. Outrage makes you invested.
I was exposed to artists, ideas & wildly diverse angles of critique I wouldn't have otherwise encountered. I had raw, reflective conversations with friends offended by the painting. Where we were forced to genuinely reckon with what if means for a person to be simultaneously right & wrong. That connection is a bridge. It will remain long after the painting is taken down.
If this article was published earlier, Mr. Benson's authority may have suffocated some of that vigorous debate. I'd be lying if I did not say that, in a way, I find it to be the final word on this controversy. Though surely not its theme.
1
No artist is entitled to a subject any more than another. Not only is art subjective, the way a piece is formed varies so greatly from artist to artist. art is meant to provoke thought, elicit emotion & all the while, offer you a glimpse of a subject through the eyes of one person.
The fact that certain people feel entitled to any one subject is disturbing to me as an artist. No one view is right or wrong. For godssake, how many times have we seen various renditions of various things from multiple artists? Plenty.
I attended art school, & imagine this: we had the same assignments at times. What made them ours (never mind vastly different from one another) were our personal perspectives. I do not approve of censorship of an artist, period. If someone else wishes to paint, sculpt, or paper mache wbatever, go for it, but in a society that is obsessively selling diversity as the buzzword of the moment, you can't have it both ways. Diversity isn't exclusive to skin colour. Diversity resides in our views of the world, our view of history, our upbringing & numerous other factors. If diversity is genuinely what we seek, there are far more perspectives to share with one another vs. attempting to suggest that only one perspective and or group is entitled to explore any one subject.
The fact that certain people feel entitled to any one subject is disturbing to me as an artist. No one view is right or wrong. For godssake, how many times have we seen various renditions of various things from multiple artists? Plenty.
I attended art school, & imagine this: we had the same assignments at times. What made them ours (never mind vastly different from one another) were our personal perspectives. I do not approve of censorship of an artist, period. If someone else wishes to paint, sculpt, or paper mache wbatever, go for it, but in a society that is obsessively selling diversity as the buzzword of the moment, you can't have it both ways. Diversity isn't exclusive to skin colour. Diversity resides in our views of the world, our view of history, our upbringing & numerous other factors. If diversity is genuinely what we seek, there are far more perspectives to share with one another vs. attempting to suggest that only one perspective and or group is entitled to explore any one subject.
6
Had the Whitney not exhbited this painting for fear of causing offence we would not be having this important discussion. That said, it would be a grand gesture if Dana Schutz, one of the most admired artists of her generation, were to offer her painting to the Museum of African-American History.
Someone here has characterized the artist's choice of subject here as 'callow'. Although it might often appear that the value or quality of such a decision is obvious, it just as well might be rooted deeper than the conscious mind is aware of and independent of moral suasion. It should hardly surprise that artistic responses to the racial climate surface. We now have a meditation on this act in a modern mode. Let it energize a move toward love and justice, rather than a restraint on artistic freedom.
On the one hand, the people who are calling for the removal and destruction of the painting are being silly. They should be given no quarter whatsoever. No one owns Emmett Till's death, and no one owns artistic expression. That said -- I have a problem with this painting too. A pretty big one. It's not that a white artist has trodden on sacred ground or expropriated a tragedy in which some people seems to foolishly imagine they hold a proprietary interest. The problem is that the artist has elaborated, in a visual medium, on something that has already been visually rendered in the most powerful way possible, yet has failed to produce a work that would begin to justify that endeavor. A poem like Brooks' or a song like Dylan's may add something to effect produced by the blankly shocking photograph of Emmett Till's ruined face. Does this painting? I don't think it does, and that's a serious problem, because unless you succeed in supplementing the moral force of that photograph, you actually risk diminishing it. And that is what I believe Ms. Schutz has done, almost certainly with the noblest intentions. She has not taken anything that belonged to someone else, and she has not committed a solecism. She has simply committed bad art about a serious subject, producing a work that, while adding nothing to our understanding, threatens to sublimate an atrocity.
1
Suppose, by sheer chance, that someone had taken a photograph and
in the background was Emmett Till and the the two men who had beaten
him and were now about to thrown him in the river.
Would that photograph not be valued for showing what actually happened
to Emmett Till and as a verification of Racial Violence in America ?
Would it make any difference what the tincture of the photographer's skin was ?
in the background was Emmett Till and the the two men who had beaten
him and were now about to thrown him in the river.
Would that photograph not be valued for showing what actually happened
to Emmett Till and as a verification of Racial Violence in America ?
Would it make any difference what the tincture of the photographer's skin was ?
2
I think the protests raise important issues about cultural appropriation; however, they do not belong INSIDE the museum. Tell me out on the street what you think and then let ME decide whether I choose to view the painting. Otherwise you are attempting to censor, just as surely as conservatives tried to censor the NEA Four. A museum is a sacred space, and no one should interfere with another's right to experience a work of art, however questionable or offensive you might find it.
4
This "righteous Christian torture" must be kept in the public eye, lest we tolerate it by forgetting it.
The story of Emmett Till is beyond racism, it is about acceptable depravity in which justice was not met, how the "perpetraitors"-of-children walked free and continue to walk free, across generations. Ultimately it is about the savagery of slavery and the extremes of despotism in the modern world.
The story of Emmett Till is beyond racism, it is about acceptable depravity in which justice was not met, how the "perpetraitors"-of-children walked free and continue to walk free, across generations. Ultimately it is about the savagery of slavery and the extremes of despotism in the modern world.
3
Telling artists what they can and can't do is a bad idea. Telling them what they can and can't do based on their race is even worse. African-Americans ought to be especially careful about letting this genie out of the bottle. They too benefit from freedom of expression.
6
Am I missing something here? Unless you are told that this image is supposed to represent a young man murdered, you will not get that from the image. Artists should understand how to convey messages graphically not verbally. This is a weak painting and I don't understand the hype or outrage.
2
This is an "issue" with no focus and no perspective. The really important essentials seem not to have relevance as those 'for and against' simply ride the publicity wave pushing the sovereign "I".
Simply there are issues that are beyond our intrusion, crimes that by their hideous revelation of who we are as a society demand humility.
Simply there are issues that are beyond our intrusion, crimes that by their hideous revelation of who we are as a society demand humility.
1
Interesting topic to whine about during Hamilton intermission.
4
This is a very uncomfortable and painful painting, and a highly uncomfortable topic to discuss. Dana had all the rights in the world to paint this piece and it should not be removed. The damage has already been done. I believe Dana painted this with good intentions, but the whole scenario seems to be about white privilege. A white person simply can't empathize what it's like to live as a person of color. Which is why it's hard for me to see this as an authentic painting. Maybe this painting has created the conversation of white privilege? And I'm totally down for people to have that discussion. Because so many people are blind to it, including myself - and I'm half white. I'm not even sure Dana realized the repercussions of this painting. And I love that this article raised the awareness of debating the painting and the topics surrounding it.
1
A well-balanced and informing article offering a beautiful invitation of healing engagement to kneel at the altars of grace and reconciliation as our greatest gifts in the quest for justice.
This portrait is timely as it attracts attention in a time that other unimaginable desecrations of lives not recognized as of equal value and legitimacy as white lives are drawing our attention.
"Repeal and disgrace" with the failed AHCA and in fact the larger part of the Trump campaign and administration agenda to me comes off as a similar spectacle of unbelievable inhumanity fueled by relentlessly wrathful intent and consciously eyeing outcomes of rivaling cruelty as the painting is inviting to take a still and introspective look at.
It´s also only a couple of years ago that a tweet was set off by a white Christian woman seconds after the acquittal of the killer of Trayvon Martin, in essence a tweet sent flying over his grave directly in the face of grieving family and friends, screaming out: "Hallelujah!"
As last year a man now President gave the impression he had been sacrificing himself for the sake of vigilance, running himself into puffing sweat all day like a real life Forrest Gump throughout New Jersey to trace down the alleged presence of Muslims shouting their version of "Oh my God!" in response to 911, all the time he could have chosen to address cases of religious outcries of triumphant vengeance that have actually been witnessed.
It is of healing reassurance others are.
This portrait is timely as it attracts attention in a time that other unimaginable desecrations of lives not recognized as of equal value and legitimacy as white lives are drawing our attention.
"Repeal and disgrace" with the failed AHCA and in fact the larger part of the Trump campaign and administration agenda to me comes off as a similar spectacle of unbelievable inhumanity fueled by relentlessly wrathful intent and consciously eyeing outcomes of rivaling cruelty as the painting is inviting to take a still and introspective look at.
It´s also only a couple of years ago that a tweet was set off by a white Christian woman seconds after the acquittal of the killer of Trayvon Martin, in essence a tweet sent flying over his grave directly in the face of grieving family and friends, screaming out: "Hallelujah!"
As last year a man now President gave the impression he had been sacrificing himself for the sake of vigilance, running himself into puffing sweat all day like a real life Forrest Gump throughout New Jersey to trace down the alleged presence of Muslims shouting their version of "Oh my God!" in response to 911, all the time he could have chosen to address cases of religious outcries of triumphant vengeance that have actually been witnessed.
It is of healing reassurance others are.
2
It's just such a bad painting....
4
Censorship of art or literature is anathema to everything we stand for as a civilization. The idea that someone's race/gender/what have you prohibits them from tackling certain topics is so far beyond ridiculous that it beggars belief.
In the aftermath of the Newtown atrocity I kept wishing that just one of the 20 pairs of parents had made the difficult but courageous decision Mrs. Till-Mobley did when she showed the world her son's mutulated and swollen body. I believe that if just one family showed their child's bullet riddled to the world, they would have done for the gun control movement what Mrs. Till-Mobley did for the civil rights movement.
I first became aware of Emmett Till by watching the PBS "Eyes On The Prize" Series when it aired in my mid 20s. His gentle life image, his image in death and the image of his painfully grieving mother will never be erased from my brain. I am sure the same is true with a vast majority of those who also saw those photos.
Although I understand and respect the decisions the Newtown parents made, I believe the same would have been true if such an image existed of just one of their murdered children.
I first became aware of Emmett Till by watching the PBS "Eyes On The Prize" Series when it aired in my mid 20s. His gentle life image, his image in death and the image of his painfully grieving mother will never be erased from my brain. I am sure the same is true with a vast majority of those who also saw those photos.
Although I understand and respect the decisions the Newtown parents made, I believe the same would have been true if such an image existed of just one of their murdered children.
1
Till's mother made the decision more than 60 years ago to open her son's casket. It's why we're still talking about it today.
3
The painting is abstract expressionist and has no meaning on its own without a title or caption. Assuming that a viewer can discern that it's a corpse in a coffin, no one would know who the corpse was. The only association with Emmett Till is the claim that it's Till's mutilated remains copied from an old magazine photo.
4
Based upon the logic of some of these protestors no one has the right to create anything that is outside of their ethnic, racial, religious, or earthly experience. That is not how creativity works or how great art is created. It's not how one writes an earthshaking poem, a timeless novel, or paints or sculpts a memorable piece of art. How does an actor create a memorable performance: using his/her abilities and imagination. I speak from personal experience as a published poet. I use my imagination and combine it with what I know and I research what I don't know. As someone who is Jewish I would not dream of telling anyone that being anything other than Jewish disqualifies them from writing about the Holocaust, pogroms, or anything associated with Judaism. My request would be that they treat it with respect.
While Ms. Schutz is not African American she is a human being. She is a parent. She has the right to attempt to express herself and capture what Emmett Till's murder/lynching means to her and to have it shown. Suggesting that the painting be removed and destroyed because she isn't the right skin color is absurd. Paint an answer. Ask her why she painted it. Discuss what's missing. Don't assume that she is trying to insult or demean what was done to Emmett Till. If you demand respect you have to be willing to give it.
While Ms. Schutz is not African American she is a human being. She is a parent. She has the right to attempt to express herself and capture what Emmett Till's murder/lynching means to her and to have it shown. Suggesting that the painting be removed and destroyed because she isn't the right skin color is absurd. Paint an answer. Ask her why she painted it. Discuss what's missing. Don't assume that she is trying to insult or demean what was done to Emmett Till. If you demand respect you have to be willing to give it.
13
A number of years ago, I was at the Civil Rights Museum in Memphis. I happened upon a group of black school children (probably middle schoolers) who were on a guided tour with one of the museum's staff. When they stopped at the Emmitt Till exhibition. the children were horrified at the story. One girl, who was perhaps 13 or 14, stood up and said something to the effect of, "Well, I wouldn't let someone stop ME from talking to a white person! Who did they think they WERE?" The guide said, "Then you'd be dead, too." I watched as her shoulders dropped and her head sunk, and she lost a couple of inches of height. Her confidence was gone. She was silenced. Several years later, I spoke to my daughter's all-minority school students in an inner-city school about the Civil Rights movement. Effectively, her school was segregated--no white students in the entire school. When I told them that white people were going to the south to register people to vote during the Civil Rights movement, they were incredulous. They couldn't believe that white people would put their lives on the line so that black people could vote. That school was about two blocks from where Rev. Reeb's church was located.
I am stymied by protestors who say this painting "absconds" something from blacks. The woman who started the whole Till killing now admits that she lied. Tamir Rice is today's Emmitt Till. This kind of protesting drives us apart; we need to work together to eliminate or minimize racism.
I am stymied by protestors who say this painting "absconds" something from blacks. The woman who started the whole Till killing now admits that she lied. Tamir Rice is today's Emmitt Till. This kind of protesting drives us apart; we need to work together to eliminate or minimize racism.
38
The lynching of Emmett Till is still a gaping wound that has never healed in the collective consciousness of African-Americans.
It is not only representative of a not too distant past, but an uncertain present and future, that makes any depiction of the actual occurance a painful reminder of how far we haven't progressed as a Nation.
Anyone who knows the story behind Till's brutal murder in the Jim Crow South, and who has seen the picture of his tortured and defaced corpse lying in an open casket, might better understand why there has been such an outcry and an uproar against this painting.
For many it is still "too soon".... and for others, it will always be.
It is not only representative of a not too distant past, but an uncertain present and future, that makes any depiction of the actual occurance a painful reminder of how far we haven't progressed as a Nation.
Anyone who knows the story behind Till's brutal murder in the Jim Crow South, and who has seen the picture of his tortured and defaced corpse lying in an open casket, might better understand why there has been such an outcry and an uproar against this painting.
For many it is still "too soon".... and for others, it will always be.
9
Cries of cultural appropriation can have the negative effect of increased segregation.
34
Cries of cultural appropriation are racist.
1
Nice piece. The protest, while possibly intended as constructive - was an act in silencing and censorship. Silencing a white artist, even symbolically, isn't warranted anymore than silencing an artist of color, even if they have been institutionally silenced for decades - two wrongs don't make a right. Talk about cultural appropriation has gone too far, to the point that any artist not addressing something purely and literally autobiographical or of their own direct heritage is primed to outrage someone. This nonsense has to stop.
49
Indeed. I'm always at a loss as to how Politically Correct supporters of diversity and inclusiveness are able to distinguish between cultural appropriation and cultural appreciation. What's the criterion for acceptability? It's rarely clear.
1
I don't see how Emmett's mother could express anything but approval of the controversial work. Whether you consider it merely a painting or more of a performance piece meme, the work evokes a visceral reaction precisely because it brings the horrific, iconic image to mind. It seems highly unlikely that any viewer would "see" the work as emulating the Till Photo without the artist having named it so. But she did. Any revulsion at the work is -- in the end -- revulsion not at the nominally artistic act, but at the rightfully reviled image of our revolting capacity to destroy a child based on his color.
19
It's a heck of a work of art, very moving, very powerful.
The Emmett Louis Till story should be required for all American children as essential American history. During the trial of Carolyn Bryant & J. W. Milam the local sheriff referring to Black persons in the court audience as, "you 'nwords'". When asked by Look magazine after their acquittal where they learned to do such a horrible thing to a person, Carolyn Bryant &J. W. Milam replied, "In the army."
The Emmett Louis Till story should be required for all American children as essential American history. During the trial of Carolyn Bryant & J. W. Milam the local sheriff referring to Black persons in the court audience as, "you 'nwords'". When asked by Look magazine after their acquittal where they learned to do such a horrible thing to a person, Carolyn Bryant &J. W. Milam replied, "In the army."
9
There's an interesting slip here. Roy Bryant was tried and acquitted for Till's murder. Carolyn Bryant recently admitted that everything she had said against Emmett Till had been a lie.
When a white person sees a picture of a lynching, he is inclined to be horrified about those who could commit such a murder. When a black person sees the same picture, hie is inclined to be horrified by how the victim suffered. I have no idea what the artist was trying to communicate. But this painting gets me closer to the victim, and I don't see any white people at all.
33
I would suggest that it's inaccurate to state that whites as a group and blacks as a group have different perceptions of a picture of a lynching. I'm a white woman but I have biracial nephews and nieces. All of my nephews have been subjected to police harassment. My husband's family includes Holocaust victims and survivors. I'm just as likely to respond to the victims suffering as to the incomprehensible actions of the perpetrators. I expect that the reaction of other viewers are likely to be similarly complex.
23
Yes, well, that must be because no white person has ever been a victim. Not really.
2
"When a white person sees a picture of a lynching, he is inclined to be horrified about those who could commit such a murder. When a black person sees the same picture, hie is inclined to be horrified by how the victim suffered."
And how in the world could you possible know that (even giving yourself an out with "inclined")? White people think alike? Black people think the same way?
And how in the world could you possible know that (even giving yourself an out with "inclined")? White people think alike? Black people think the same way?
4
I don't get the point of this essay. (Someone needs to get tenure?) I thought it was a very affective and effective painting of a terrible event in the tradition of otherunjust death paintings e.g. Ben Shahn's "Sacco and Vanzetti." (Do we want to mention the Daid's -- Death of Socrates and Death of Marat? -- all of which are studied.i There were lots of deaths associated with.... in this case the Civil Right's movement --three young men -- one black, two white....James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner. But this very powerful painting reminds us of one particular travesty that goes on and on. A painting of the death of an innocent which already has become part of the canon.
19
ANY minor arts event that can be used to sell progressivism and hatred for the history of the United States while identifying the paper and the writer as politically correct will be written up very sympathetically in what used to be the New York Times. No matter HOW minor such event is outside of Manhattan.
1
Have we come to the point in time when someone not like us cannot create art depicting us? That to do so is to wrongly appropriate our culture?
If that be the case then I guess I cannot enjoy or pay to see art created by someone other than a person with similar characteristics as me, is that accurate, Mr Benson?
This entire argument is so wrong on so many levels. I guess Miranda was wrongly appropriating Anglo-Saxon culture by creating "Hamilton". I guess as an Irish person I should not have paid to see "Get Out" (BTW, great movie) as by watching I have apparently breached some artificial line. I guess I was wrong to enjoy Spike Lee or Akira Kurosawa movies or Walter mosely and James Baldwin books. I guess you will tell me I did not understand them as well.
So black art is for blacks and white art is for whites and Chinese art is for Chinese people and if anyone tries to create art not pigeonholed to there constituency they are wrongly appropriating someone else's culture.
Awful big talk from a guy working as an African American Studies professor and has worked at many black oriented publications but from his picture looks as if he could pass for white. Which side of colorism were you on (see "School Daze" Spike's movie) when you were in college?
If that be the case then I guess I cannot enjoy or pay to see art created by someone other than a person with similar characteristics as me, is that accurate, Mr Benson?
This entire argument is so wrong on so many levels. I guess Miranda was wrongly appropriating Anglo-Saxon culture by creating "Hamilton". I guess as an Irish person I should not have paid to see "Get Out" (BTW, great movie) as by watching I have apparently breached some artificial line. I guess I was wrong to enjoy Spike Lee or Akira Kurosawa movies or Walter mosely and James Baldwin books. I guess you will tell me I did not understand them as well.
So black art is for blacks and white art is for whites and Chinese art is for Chinese people and if anyone tries to create art not pigeonholed to there constituency they are wrongly appropriating someone else's culture.
Awful big talk from a guy working as an African American Studies professor and has worked at many black oriented publications but from his picture looks as if he could pass for white. Which side of colorism were you on (see "School Daze" Spike's movie) when you were in college?
23
Excellent comment, Thank you.
1
The PC pendulum has swung all the way back to where it was in the mid-1990's and African Americans continue to push it past that ridiculous point at the peril of a movement, Black Lives Matter, that has true merit. Nonsense like this non-starter of an issue will alienate non-blacks to all demands for social justice by the black community. Pick your battles more wisely. Artists appropriate from others regularly and have been doing so for millennia.
27
An d I think you should frame your arguments more wisely. To dismiss concerns as 'nonsense' seems to me unnecessarily disrespectful and somewhat ignorant of the iconic space this image holds for black Americans. And to suggest that it will lead to the alienation of whites from black social justice concerns reflects poorly on just now conditional you think white support is.
Mind you, I'm not I favor of censoring this work. I AM in favor of having a constructive, respectful dialogue about it.
Mind you, I'm not I favor of censoring this work. I AM in favor of having a constructive, respectful dialogue about it.
2
Black people are not waiting for you to help us. You don't need an engraved invitation to fight for justice. I don't know where I fall on this issue. But what I can't abide is white folks telling black folks we are alienating you from coalition building with us by the stances some of us are taking. If you can be so easily turned away from fighting for justice, then you are down for it anyway. Go where you're comfortable.
5
Schutz claimed empathy. I just don't see how a white woman without a black son could empathize with a black mother with a black son, no matter how well-intended the white woman is. Are white people really so great that they can know what it's like to feel the pain of inequality and injustice faced by black people? Calling it an american story is a credit due, but the resulting pain can surely be felt more viscerally by some americans and not others.
Formally speaking, the painting does not carry the neo-realistic shock of a black and white newsprint photo. Its abstractness demands a non-formalist reading. Lucky it has a title. One that would suggest the figure is underserving of a name. Or, perhaps the lack of name for the figured serves as a comment on America's devaluation of the black man. If that's the comment, it is a powerful one. Yet one can't help question whether there is any lingering abuse of power in having a White gaze, or purely voyeuristic delight. Regardless, the artist has been given ample room to clarify intent. She could have left it to the viewer, and not made excuses which may have been most powerful. Instead, she stated her as intention as one mother relating to another. I don't disqualify her feelings. But she sure does seem full of herself to think she can empathize. Her defense of her work comes off as condescending or patronizing. Which, I suppose, is the reality of most Western Art and most white liberalism.
Formally speaking, the painting does not carry the neo-realistic shock of a black and white newsprint photo. Its abstractness demands a non-formalist reading. Lucky it has a title. One that would suggest the figure is underserving of a name. Or, perhaps the lack of name for the figured serves as a comment on America's devaluation of the black man. If that's the comment, it is a powerful one. Yet one can't help question whether there is any lingering abuse of power in having a White gaze, or purely voyeuristic delight. Regardless, the artist has been given ample room to clarify intent. She could have left it to the viewer, and not made excuses which may have been most powerful. Instead, she stated her as intention as one mother relating to another. I don't disqualify her feelings. But she sure does seem full of herself to think she can empathize. Her defense of her work comes off as condescending or patronizing. Which, I suppose, is the reality of most Western Art and most white liberalism.
4
Respectfully, if the artist, as a white person, had sought to contribute to the "devaluation of the black man", she had but to remain silent in the face of institutionalized violent racism.
1
You don't see empathy because you lack it. Empathy is not a feeling that you just do or don't have -- it is a capacity. It has to be practiced, in order to be felt. No two people are going to have the exact same experience of something -- but they can choose to exercise their imagination. Or they can choose to remain smug in their assumption that because of their skin color, they have more of it.
1
Well said... context is important, the only place "whiter" than Trump's White House is the "art world".
Emmet Till lives on in this work, through the image and the stories created, including this article which educated me in a part of the movement for which I've blurred memory into the unrecognizable. Now I see the face and I know the name and the story and I -and all who newly experience- grow with this essential knowledge that strengthens our commitment to never again forget.
10
I wish that people could see this work of art as intended and as a major work of talent. I think this painting would be considered as extraordinary and well worth a Whitney visit save for the race of the artist. The piece is intended as a modern and important reimagining of the open casket of Emmet Till regardless of the artist's white privilege.
6
People have every right to protest and to be offended by any work of art, this one or another. It's good to have the discussion in our society.
But go to the March 21st article (linked in the article by the word "controversy") in which an alleged artist says "white free speech and white creative freedom have been founded on the constraint of others and are not natural rights" -- and then calls for censorship. It "must go".
Does she really think that in a country governed by Donald Trump that it makes sense to allow people to declare themselves arbiters about what is acceptable for viewing?
It doesn't. Free expression is the weapon of the powerless. When leftists and liberals agree with the point that certain things are not allowed to be expressed they are sewing seeds that will end with them unable to speak against injustice.
The Whitney has the right to hang the painting. Offended people have the right to complain about it. Nobody has the right to decide for others what other people can read, hear or see. Because that way lies Stalinism.
But go to the March 21st article (linked in the article by the word "controversy") in which an alleged artist says "white free speech and white creative freedom have been founded on the constraint of others and are not natural rights" -- and then calls for censorship. It "must go".
Does she really think that in a country governed by Donald Trump that it makes sense to allow people to declare themselves arbiters about what is acceptable for viewing?
It doesn't. Free expression is the weapon of the powerless. When leftists and liberals agree with the point that certain things are not allowed to be expressed they are sewing seeds that will end with them unable to speak against injustice.
The Whitney has the right to hang the painting. Offended people have the right to complain about it. Nobody has the right to decide for others what other people can read, hear or see. Because that way lies Stalinism.
42
I see the golden halo above his mutilated face. Emmett was murdered months before I was born, which always amazes me and shames me at the same time. I went to see "I Am Not Your Negro" last month and was again, as a white person, amazed and ashamed.
It is good we are going through this.
It is good we are going through this.
12
The Cult of Emmett Till is one of the more interesting religious phenomena in 21st Century America.
4
What in the world do you mean?
5
The bravery of Mrs Till-Mobley was in taking a private image and allowing it to be made public.
The painting is powerful, moving, and devastating.
To take the image out of the public domain for artists based on their skin color to me runs counter to the brave act of Mrs Till Mobley in bringing this image into the light of day.
The painting is powerful, moving, and devastating.
To take the image out of the public domain for artists based on their skin color to me runs counter to the brave act of Mrs Till Mobley in bringing this image into the light of day.
24
Only African-American news photographers should be allowed to take and publish photographs of African-Americans killed by the police? Only black journalists should be allowed to write articles about the lives of black Americans? No non-African-American screenwriter should write a movie script about African Americans, and white novelists have to stick to depicting characters of their own race? Work not conforming to these strictures should be censored or destroyed? Is that where we want to be headed? Seems like a dangerous path.
47
My first thought when I read the initial article about the controversy over this painting was, "I wonder what his mother would think." She had dedicated her life to telling the world about her son's brutal murder, exposing the racism and hatred of white America. I first heard Emmett Till's story when I accompanied a group of white high school teachers to Mamie Till Mobley's Chicago home. Her account of her son's trip to Mississippi, his death, her decision to open his casket so the "world could see what they've done to my son," and the so-called trial that ended in his killers' acquittals was heartbreaking. There are many white people who still do not know the story of Emmett Till. Perhaps this controversy will result in more awareness of his story and a willingness to engage in a conversation about ways we can confront this terrible national disgrace of racism.
18
To paint suffering, is not to feel it. To be a mother, is not to know the pain of losing a child. To know an oppression, is not to know all oppression.
The painting doesn't hold a candle to the reality. The reality was and is so much worse. They seem unrelated, except by vague reference. What then was Schutz doing in this work? The face in the casket is a play on her usual style, therefore the brutality goes unrecognized. What then did her talent lend us?
So much truth was denied, concealed and swept under the rug - again and again. The white woman, Carolyn Bryant. The white men, Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam. The white jury. The white judge. Where are they implicated? Where is Schutz? Where am I?
The painting doesn't hold a candle to the reality. The reality was and is so much worse. They seem unrelated, except by vague reference. What then was Schutz doing in this work? The face in the casket is a play on her usual style, therefore the brutality goes unrecognized. What then did her talent lend us?
So much truth was denied, concealed and swept under the rug - again and again. The white woman, Carolyn Bryant. The white men, Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam. The white jury. The white judge. Where are they implicated? Where is Schutz? Where am I?
9
She is an independent artist. She explained her motivation and the feeling behind it. Her race is totally irrelevant.
3
Exactly... this painting just prettifies a monstrous brutality, distances us from the crime by making it "art", plying "her usual style" which is repetitively decorative, and yes, in a sense making the suffering "beautiful". Yesterday, Roberta Smith maintained that painting monumentalizes and makes "present" in a ay that photography never can. It is completely the opposite. This horror, filtered through Schutz' signature style becomes just another painting, with no resonance at all if not for the title. And no, white people can not "know" the dark fear that has run in every black human being's consciousness for 400 years.
1
Thank you for this thoughtful article. The protesters mean well, but I believe they are mistaken and that the result of following their advice would result in "artistic apartheid" in which only those part of one group can write, paint, sing, sculpt, comment, etc., depending on ethnicity.
28
I wasn't even school age when Emmet Till was brutally murdered, but I remember that folks were shaken by this murder.
I remember, searching for and finding a well worn picture of Till in the Jet Magazine that I had seen lots of people viewing.
Having been warned not to look at the picture, I was determined to see what was so upsetting to grownups; terrified into bodily tremors at the view, the mangled person was more frightening than this four year old could endure.
I was afraid to admit that I had sneaked a terrified peek.
I lost my mother to sudden illness at about the same time as the Till murder. I still remember seeing mother's body in her coffin, but what I remember most was seeing my mom's body convulsing in her bed, thru a crack in her door, waiting for an ambulance to take her to a "black" hospital. "Coloreds" were not allowed to receive care in the "white" hospital in town.
I remember peering into her coffin and I remember thinking that she died because she was not cared for in the hospital in town.
These experiences impacted my world view; far, far beyond those experiences in rural Virginia.
Just as many whites, Christians, Jews and perhaps some Atheists too, marched and sacrificed all during the civil rights marches and demonstrations, I have learned that compassionate people are attuned to suffering and injustice; we seek to comprehend.
I say, Ms. Schultz, you must express your compassion, your art, in remembrances of the death of Emmett Till.
I remember, searching for and finding a well worn picture of Till in the Jet Magazine that I had seen lots of people viewing.
Having been warned not to look at the picture, I was determined to see what was so upsetting to grownups; terrified into bodily tremors at the view, the mangled person was more frightening than this four year old could endure.
I was afraid to admit that I had sneaked a terrified peek.
I lost my mother to sudden illness at about the same time as the Till murder. I still remember seeing mother's body in her coffin, but what I remember most was seeing my mom's body convulsing in her bed, thru a crack in her door, waiting for an ambulance to take her to a "black" hospital. "Coloreds" were not allowed to receive care in the "white" hospital in town.
I remember peering into her coffin and I remember thinking that she died because she was not cared for in the hospital in town.
These experiences impacted my world view; far, far beyond those experiences in rural Virginia.
Just as many whites, Christians, Jews and perhaps some Atheists too, marched and sacrificed all during the civil rights marches and demonstrations, I have learned that compassionate people are attuned to suffering and injustice; we seek to comprehend.
I say, Ms. Schultz, you must express your compassion, your art, in remembrances of the death of Emmett Till.
59
I need to make a correction to this bio; I was four years old when my mother died, but I was nine years old when
Emmett Till died. I was able to read. Sorry for conflating the time lines. Nothing else is changed, except my now old brain.
Emmett Till died. I was able to read. Sorry for conflating the time lines. Nothing else is changed, except my now old brain.
Dear JRS, I am sorry you lost your mother and at such a young age. I am sorry about those experiences. And your thoughts that your mother might not have died if she could have been taken to the white hospital. I'm reminded of the short play, 'The Death of Bessie Smith'; the great singer died after being turned away from a 'white' hospital; I played her in a scene in acting class in 1970 -- I didn't know what I was doing, a white person attempting to play Bessie Smith. I congratulate you on your curiosity. And for surviving, intact. My thoughts are with your mother. And my outrage goes with you.
3
The lynching of Emmett Till, more than the stubborn sit-in resistance of Rosa Parks, is what got the civil rights movement rolling. The Chicago youngster was said to have whistled at a white woman in deep Mississippi, a hanging offense for black males of any age. The woman later admitted lying about young Emmett disrespecting her but the damage was done. Southern justice would have its way that night in September 1955.
Mamie Till-Mobley wanted the world to see what she saw when her son's remains arrived at the Chicago train station in a box. Ebony-Jet published John Johnson agreed to publish the awful photo that today and forever will be a damning indictment of American racism, north and south. America will never live down the shame of that crime.
Mrs. Till-Mobley always said that her son had a problem with the sibilant S sound and his slight lisp would sometimes come out as a whistle. His executioners weren't interested in excuses or explanations. The honor of the southern white belle had to be defended, even if it took two grown men to subdue one young boy.
Dana Schutz' artwork doesn't come close to capturing the horror of that night. What happened to Emmett Till could happen to any black boy. The ugliness of racism can be seen in Emmett Till's open casket. When white folks use the N word and diminish people of color out of societal habits, all they have to do is look at Emmett Till's mutilated features to see how hateful their racism is to all black Americans.
Mamie Till-Mobley wanted the world to see what she saw when her son's remains arrived at the Chicago train station in a box. Ebony-Jet published John Johnson agreed to publish the awful photo that today and forever will be a damning indictment of American racism, north and south. America will never live down the shame of that crime.
Mrs. Till-Mobley always said that her son had a problem with the sibilant S sound and his slight lisp would sometimes come out as a whistle. His executioners weren't interested in excuses or explanations. The honor of the southern white belle had to be defended, even if it took two grown men to subdue one young boy.
Dana Schutz' artwork doesn't come close to capturing the horror of that night. What happened to Emmett Till could happen to any black boy. The ugliness of racism can be seen in Emmett Till's open casket. When white folks use the N word and diminish people of color out of societal habits, all they have to do is look at Emmett Till's mutilated features to see how hateful their racism is to all black Americans.
2
This is Emmett Till's second wake—the one white people are invited to attend. The one to which they are charged admission.
Unlike the first wake, the young Till in Schutz's "Open Casket" has been "aestheticized" with "painted" injuries. No doubt a nod to the "brutality of fact" painter Francis Bacon impressed on his intense and fragmented portraits. There remains a significant difference between Schutz's portrait and the photographs of Till. In the D.S, most seem to accept the concept of "truth conveyed by a lie" (the false premise inherent in any painted image), but we seem to forget that in the Till photographs truth is conveyed by fact.
I'm not convinced by D.S's painting. It is doing a fine job of getting people to think, and talk about Till's brief life and gruesome death, but this, I believe, has very little to do with the painting which doesn't convey the feeling of the brutality. It "brushes" past it with D.S's usual finesse (though thankfully with out her glib humor). This is a subject that requires more of her considerable talent to pull off.
I was pleased to read that D.S noted that the image/painting was worth pursing even if it failed. And it did, as a painting, but it succeeded as a cultural flashpoint.
D.S. won't likely profit directly from this painting. But the Whitney certainly will—it charges viewers to see it. Perhaps Adam Weinberg will extend proceed admission proceeds of this Biennial to an org. dedicated to the eradication of violence in America.
Unlike the first wake, the young Till in Schutz's "Open Casket" has been "aestheticized" with "painted" injuries. No doubt a nod to the "brutality of fact" painter Francis Bacon impressed on his intense and fragmented portraits. There remains a significant difference between Schutz's portrait and the photographs of Till. In the D.S, most seem to accept the concept of "truth conveyed by a lie" (the false premise inherent in any painted image), but we seem to forget that in the Till photographs truth is conveyed by fact.
I'm not convinced by D.S's painting. It is doing a fine job of getting people to think, and talk about Till's brief life and gruesome death, but this, I believe, has very little to do with the painting which doesn't convey the feeling of the brutality. It "brushes" past it with D.S's usual finesse (though thankfully with out her glib humor). This is a subject that requires more of her considerable talent to pull off.
I was pleased to read that D.S noted that the image/painting was worth pursing even if it failed. And it did, as a painting, but it succeeded as a cultural flashpoint.
D.S. won't likely profit directly from this painting. But the Whitney certainly will—it charges viewers to see it. Perhaps Adam Weinberg will extend proceed admission proceeds of this Biennial to an org. dedicated to the eradication of violence in America.
4
The Whitney has free Fridays, 7pm-10pm.
1
We need to stop acting like only people who have experienced a specific horror can comment or artistically work on it. We have a common sense of humanity that must be relied upon, and moreso encouraged to develop and learn from things just like this. The artist has every right to her interpretation. You don't like it: don't look.
I read Samuel L Jackson's comments about the black British actor playing an American black man in "Get Out" and I find it ridiculous that we are inserting tests like this into acting and the arts. What's next, only a rape victim can play a rape victim? This is what art is, an imagining. A young, black kid being murdered due to racism is not a black problem. Marginalization of any group concerns us all. I don't need to be black or have experienced racism as a black person to understand the pain, the outrage, and to feel-- personally and deeply--the despicable injustice. No one in my family has been murdered, and yet I am able to empathize with someone who lost a family member that way. I get that it's different to feel it (I have a child with lifelong special needs) but I'd never belittle someone for trying earnestly to imagine walking in my shoes.
I read Samuel L Jackson's comments about the black British actor playing an American black man in "Get Out" and I find it ridiculous that we are inserting tests like this into acting and the arts. What's next, only a rape victim can play a rape victim? This is what art is, an imagining. A young, black kid being murdered due to racism is not a black problem. Marginalization of any group concerns us all. I don't need to be black or have experienced racism as a black person to understand the pain, the outrage, and to feel-- personally and deeply--the despicable injustice. No one in my family has been murdered, and yet I am able to empathize with someone who lost a family member that way. I get that it's different to feel it (I have a child with lifelong special needs) but I'd never belittle someone for trying earnestly to imagine walking in my shoes.
20
Oh, for God's sake! Do you really think that black people are the only ones who feel frustration, fear and horror over the history of white racism in this country? Do you really think that no white people feel it? I know, I know -- we don't care about white people's feelings. But can we at least acknowledge that some white people actually do feel profound frustration at being assumed to be the same as people whose thinking is totally alien to their own. What is the word for just looking at someone's skin and assuming you know that person inside and out? Furthermore, in what country or nation is there no racism?
12
However a white person feels about racism it cannot be equated in any way to how a black person feels sbout it.
And I say this as someone who's white, but who listens.
And I say this as someone who's white, but who listens.
2
Interesting that the demonstrater isn't deemed important enough to have a name here. Let this person write an essay.
2
"Let this person write an essay."
There were SEVERAL "protesters", and if you follow the first link in the article you can read all about them:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/21/arts/design/painting-of-emmett-till-a...
There were SEVERAL "protesters", and if you follow the first link in the article you can read all about them:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/21/arts/design/painting-of-emmett-till-a...
Everyone who claims the racism that killed Emmett Till has ended should note that 50 years after the Loving v Virginia case, 40% of Republicans still believe that whites and blacks should not be able marry. Since so many State Houses are controlled by Republicans, perhaps a third or more of the states would still prohibit interracial marriage had the Supreme Court not stepped in fifty years ago.
3
The whole idea of "cultural appropriation" is very strange to me. Unless someone has found a way to patent and copyright a culture. Which would seem to me even stranger.
24
If Dana Schutz did not have the right to paint this work, then all of those paintings of Jesus on the cross have to come down--Jesus was a Jew, and all of those artists were Christian. Jesus lived in the Roman empire; none of the artists did.
And as for race, Dana Schutz and Emmett Till shared this: they were both part of the human race. And it is that commonality that, we may hope, will one day surmount the matter of skin color as we regard one another.
And as for race, Dana Schutz and Emmett Till shared this: they were both part of the human race. And it is that commonality that, we may hope, will one day surmount the matter of skin color as we regard one another.
26
Not all the artists painting Jesus were/are Christian. See the article Jewish artists reclaiming Jesus.
http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/culture/leisure/.premium-1.773501
http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/culture/leisure/.premium-1.773501
2
Yet another rerun in the theft of our story masquerading as an educational lesson. If they donate the painting to a museum focused on our story that would show her intent was genuine but we all see where this is going. Fast forward to the future, I'm sure she or her family will make a profit.
Whites do not hesitate to appropriate our culture, struggle, styles, bodies, speech, creative arts (music, comedy, etc.) to make a dollar for themselves. When we try, it is always a mission to unlock the tightly fastened gate they created. Some make it through but we know most of us never do.
Whites do not hesitate to appropriate our culture, struggle, styles, bodies, speech, creative arts (music, comedy, etc.) to make a dollar for themselves. When we try, it is always a mission to unlock the tightly fastened gate they created. Some make it through but we know most of us never do.
3
What's preventing you from making art of your own, if you claim that your own perspective is so much more relevant as any artist's of any ethnicity?
3
I have been a human, albeit a white one, for 70 years. In my early years in NC, the injustices of segregation and racism were already edging into my consciousness, and I spent most of my life enjoying people of all ethnic, cultural, national backgrounds...neither accepting or rejecting them based on their differences, but embracing them because I saw us as all the same. I have tried to work with whatever skills I possess to reverse the racism I see. One thing I that has challenged me is that many Blacks close the gates between us as surely as any assumed White Privilege. I spent 6 months trying to reach any Black political activists to join me in a push to get Black youths registered to vote so they would have a voice. I realized that to many I would appear as just an old white lady, and perhaps might be prejudged as not having their interests at heart. So I sought a compatriot in the hope that together we might be effective. I called churches, schools, social groups, protest groups. Not a single person of color returned a call, an email or a plea on facebook. Empathy and compassion ARE common factors, but true understanding only works when the gates are unlocked on both sides.
4
My twin and I had barely turned 11 early in August, 1955, a year removed from a summer in the South, in Chattanooga, Tennessee. As Northern "colored" boys, we had been warned about the dangers of the South. Still, we were totally unprepared for the spread in Jet Magazine in September, 1955, a fortnight following the kidnaping of Emmett Till. My reaction to the pictures was one of dread, horror, revulsion and a severance from America's promise. I felt the ground beneath me shift, figuratively, and almost literally, as I stood gaping at the once-human form in his casket. Our grandmother, a native South Carolinian, reluctantly allowed us to look at it. I was never a boy after that.
The "Negro" intelligentsia of the day, in Boston, where we lived, and elsewhere, were outraged--not only by the crime itself--but by John H. Johnson's decision to publish the atrocity and by Mamie Till-Bradley's decision to put her unrecognizable son before the world.
I shun personal reminiscences; please allow me this one. I asked my mother, a stern woman, "why did they do this to him?" Her waspish "Negro aristocracy" answer was a sharp, snappish stinging "he was a rude colored boy in the South!" I was appalled by her mean-spirited reply. Much later, I contrasted her anger with Mrs. Till-Mobley's searing grief and attempted to reconcile opposite reactions of two black mothers. I still can't.
This Whitney display needs the widest audience imaginable. If we don't remember the past, we'll repeat it.
The "Negro" intelligentsia of the day, in Boston, where we lived, and elsewhere, were outraged--not only by the crime itself--but by John H. Johnson's decision to publish the atrocity and by Mamie Till-Bradley's decision to put her unrecognizable son before the world.
I shun personal reminiscences; please allow me this one. I asked my mother, a stern woman, "why did they do this to him?" Her waspish "Negro aristocracy" answer was a sharp, snappish stinging "he was a rude colored boy in the South!" I was appalled by her mean-spirited reply. Much later, I contrasted her anger with Mrs. Till-Mobley's searing grief and attempted to reconcile opposite reactions of two black mothers. I still can't.
This Whitney display needs the widest audience imaginable. If we don't remember the past, we'll repeat it.
79
soxared: 'Her waspish "Negro aristocracy" answer was a sharp, snappish stinging "he was a rude colored boy in the South!"'
In print, anyway, it sounds like she was speaking sarcastically in the voice of a Southern white. In that interpretation, she was not condemning the "boy", but the people who killed him.
In print, anyway, it sounds like she was speaking sarcastically in the voice of a Southern white. In that interpretation, she was not condemning the "boy", but the people who killed him.
@soxared
You write with great honesty and sensitivity. I'm heartened that, although our backgrounds are quite different, we often arrive at the same place.
You write with great honesty and sensitivity. I'm heartened that, although our backgrounds are quite different, we often arrive at the same place.
As someone who was born in Tennessee and raised in Boston (father from the south, mother from Boston), I wonder how your mother would have reacted if she knew that the woman who had accused Emmett Till of having been "rude" lied about the incident. Your post is amazing. Thank you.
A new generation learns about Emmett Till, that his story is not that old and not that new. It's evidence of an incurable epidemic. "I didn't know," they say. Now you do, children. Now you do.
14
Art exists both to express the artist's experience of being human and to express the artist's experience of all that is not the artist: the other. We exalt diversity but punish those who strive to be in the skin of those who are not themselves? Should Michelangelo not have painted God? Should a man not paint a woman? What is the Black Experience if not something that is shared by every person who has ever experienced persecution? And if there is a human being who does not know what persecution feels like or looks like, then I guess it's a good thing that Dana Schutz had the nerve to paint it. What she painted might or might not please Emmet Till's mother, but nobody should be painting for anybody's mother. Period.
14
'What is the Black Experience if not something that
is shared by every person who has ever experienced persecution?'
This is the best explanation I've heard for why I. a white woman, have hung a poster saying, 'I Am Not Your Negro', an ad for the documentary about James Baldwin, up on my wall.
is shared by every person who has ever experienced persecution?'
This is the best explanation I've heard for why I. a white woman, have hung a poster saying, 'I Am Not Your Negro', an ad for the documentary about James Baldwin, up on my wall.
1
Let's move forward. Why keep talking about all the wrongs of the past? NYT has vast resources so much more to explore, spiritually, historically, etc etc. Instead, just regurgitates old stuff.
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." -George Santayana
7
And an addendum to Megan Hulce
"Art like life should be free, since both are experimental." (also from) George Santayana
"Art like life should be free, since both are experimental." (also from) George Santayana
2
Well written and nicely observed. Thank you.
3
White racism killed Emmet Till. In painting "Open Casket" Dana Schutz forces us to remember this fact. She should be commended for her courage.
29
Perhaps once the Whitney exhibit closes, the artist will give her painting to the National Museum of African History & Culture.
9
I get it:
1. White artists do not have , or maybe are required to have permission, from Afro Americans to address Afro-American issues.
2. Only Jewish people can create works about the Holocaust.
3. Only Japanese or people of Japanese descent can address issues such as the internment and confiscation of their property in WWII.
4. If you are a Mexican American artist, sorry, you are limited only to Mexican American issues (not El alvadorian/Guatamalan/etc).
5. If you are Muslim artist, please don't touch Christianity or any other religion.
6. If you don't like the speaker at your campus (Middleburry) create a riot.
and finally,
7. Rappers, don't rap about White People, please.
8. If you are a white writer, write only in white.
1984 is just around the corner.
1. White artists do not have , or maybe are required to have permission, from Afro Americans to address Afro-American issues.
2. Only Jewish people can create works about the Holocaust.
3. Only Japanese or people of Japanese descent can address issues such as the internment and confiscation of their property in WWII.
4. If you are a Mexican American artist, sorry, you are limited only to Mexican American issues (not El alvadorian/Guatamalan/etc).
5. If you are Muslim artist, please don't touch Christianity or any other religion.
6. If you don't like the speaker at your campus (Middleburry) create a riot.
and finally,
7. Rappers, don't rap about White People, please.
8. If you are a white writer, write only in white.
1984 is just around the corner.
29
Raz doesn't quite go far enough.
Men can only write about men.
Women can only write about women
Oh, lord, what do we do the gender fluid write about?
Children can only write about children, of course. (Sorry you YA writers!)
I'm not sure 1984 is around the corner, but absurdity certainly is.
Men can only write about men.
Women can only write about women
Oh, lord, what do we do the gender fluid write about?
Children can only write about children, of course. (Sorry you YA writers!)
I'm not sure 1984 is around the corner, but absurdity certainly is.
9
I have not doubt that Dan Schutz had the right to make the painting and the Whitney Museum has the right to display it, and I assume that her intentions were good. That said, if I were a well-known white artist like her I would enter this territory with extreme caution - I assume that she can't be so naive as to think that some negative reaction wasn't possible. Those who protest the inclusion of the painting have the right to do so as well........this democracy business is a mess.
3
Maybe off subject, but this reminds me of the outrage over the Vietnam Veterans Memorial when it was revealed who won the design competition. Everyone loved it until. Then the outrage came out. When's it going to stop? When are we going to be people working together, cooperating, working it out, to get it right?
11
I wish I could have seen this painting without the voices for and against it. I wish I could have seen it without the knowing that its placement in the biennial most certainly had as much to do with anticipation of its controversy as with its actual merit as a work of art. So well-intentioned everyone seems to be--so convinced of what is right. But maybe hoping for a controversy even as a flashpoint for social self-examination and awareness isn't right when the controversy in question is an image of a ghastly crime ...especially one which resonates so strongly that the memory of the murder of an innocent child clearly overwhelms any effort to incorporate its story into a larger narrative on racism in our country--or at least an art show which wants to make a nod in that direction.....but, I do wonder--what would be made of the work if the title were "Lynched Child"? Too vague? Too horrific? Perhaps both..but also all the more truthful..for Emmett Till was not the only victim. The real truth to be told is not the repeated tales of a few martyrs but the vast oppression of an entire population.
8
I had the chance to talk to Parker Bright at the Whitney during his protest and felt he was doing important work by asking the question who is entitled to paint this picture. Should a White artist paint this seminal Black image. The function of an art exhibit isn't just to display pretty pictures. It's to get people to think, with this exhibit particularly focused on politics and art. Bright contributed an important layer -- the death of Till, his image, Schultz painting, and the protest. And, of course, we now also have discussions in the Times and elsewhere. The complexity stimulates discussion and elevates Till's story, the Biennial, and the museum experience.
13
Rick: "... Parker Bright ... was doing important work by asking the question who is entitled to paint this picture."
Parker Bright didn't just ask questions. Bright "position[ed] himself, sometimes with a few other protesters, in front of the work to partly block its view."
White Artist’s Painting of Emmett Till at Whitney Biennial Draws Protests
By RANDY KENNEDY
MARCH 21, 2017
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/21/arts/design/painting-of-emmett-till-a...
Parker Bright didn't just ask questions. Bright "position[ed] himself, sometimes with a few other protesters, in front of the work to partly block its view."
White Artist’s Painting of Emmett Till at Whitney Biennial Draws Protests
By RANDY KENNEDY
MARCH 21, 2017
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/21/arts/design/painting-of-emmett-till-a...
2
I must disagree with this entirely. There is not a complexity. Oversensitivity? Sure. As I stated in a separate post, while yes, art is subjective & as artists, we want to garner strong reactions. My issue is that I can't say I believe the attempt to censor/police creativity solely based on the colour of one's skin is important work. It's a way of attempting to silence creativity. If one feels so strongly, by all means, please give us dozens more pieces. There are several generations who know nothing of this event and it would generate awareness.
1
I'm curious about what this means for other forms of art. We want more diversity in movies and tv shows; if I write a novel I want to bring in more characters than just white people. If we live in a culture yearning for more diversity in art across genres, are there limitations on who can create the art? Can I, a white woman, include the story of a black woman in a story I create? If not, will my work be criticized as too exclusionary?
I'm worried that we have pinpointed a real problem--lack of diversity in art--but limited the number of people who can help to alleviate the issue.
I worry about the crossover into academia, as well. As we try to diversify the college course offerings and encourage professors in humanity departments to explore topics beyond the western world, will there be a limitation on peoplw who can uncover and write about horrors they may find committed against people of color, religious minorities, or LGBT people?
I'm curious about other people's thoughts on these same questions.
I'm worried that we have pinpointed a real problem--lack of diversity in art--but limited the number of people who can help to alleviate the issue.
I worry about the crossover into academia, as well. As we try to diversify the college course offerings and encourage professors in humanity departments to explore topics beyond the western world, will there be a limitation on peoplw who can uncover and write about horrors they may find committed against people of color, religious minorities, or LGBT people?
I'm curious about other people's thoughts on these same questions.
6
Emmett Till was abducted, tortured, and shot, after which his body was thrown into the river. He wasn't "lynched."
5
Roger W. Smith: 'He [Till] wasn't "lynched."'
Killing by hanging is not an essential part of the meaning of "lynch":
"to put to death (as by hanging) by mob action without legal sanction"
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/lynch
Killing by hanging is not an essential part of the meaning of "lynch":
"to put to death (as by hanging) by mob action without legal sanction"
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/lynch
1
To YqPr:
From the 1880's, Roger W. Smith would seem to be correct regarding the use of "lynch".
http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=lynch
From the 1880's, Roger W. Smith would seem to be correct regarding the use of "lynch".
http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=lynch
1
I don't believe in the claim that only black people or people of color are capable or permitted to paint or inother ways create art which depicts black propel or persons of color, or of significant events involving them. That sort of claim is in and of itself a racist construct. A white man such as myself might never fully appreciate the experience of a black person in the world, but that does not make artistic depictions by whites of persons of color inherently evil or exploitive. Let us not seek to exclude each other from appreciating and understanding each other.
12
For me, I like the intentions. The painting, not my taste.
But censorship, no. We aren't there, yet.
But censorship, no. We aren't there, yet.
8
It is segregation pure an simple if only black artists can make art about blacks, only asians about asians, whites about whites, etc. So does that mean only women can paint women?
One of the most important things about art is to open peoples' eyes, ears, and minds to new ways of seeing, hearing and thinking. When Picasso started Cubism he changed the way our civilization saw the world, Stravinsky changed they way we hear, it was shocking when they started and tame and normal now .
Another thing about art, science, and culture is that it is always taking from and building on the past. I'm a sculptor and one of my best images was inspired by Matisse's The Dance made 100 years ago.
If you don't like some art then don't look at it. But don't censor it.
https://jaylagemann.blogspot.com
One of the most important things about art is to open peoples' eyes, ears, and minds to new ways of seeing, hearing and thinking. When Picasso started Cubism he changed the way our civilization saw the world, Stravinsky changed they way we hear, it was shocking when they started and tame and normal now .
Another thing about art, science, and culture is that it is always taking from and building on the past. I'm a sculptor and one of my best images was inspired by Matisse's The Dance made 100 years ago.
If you don't like some art then don't look at it. But don't censor it.
https://jaylagemann.blogspot.com
18
Was this whole controversy made up just to get publicity?
7
I wasn't alive when Emmett Till died. I had to learn about him, years later, by stumbling upon an old magazine article. I remember feeling horror at his brutal death and rage at those who caused it. The controversy surrounding this picture ignores the incredible opportunity to teach a NEW generation to FEEL these same emotions and to learn from them. I suppose one's reaction to this painting is a matter of priorities, I just wish education was a little farther up the list.
12
For mothers, if this was your son, wouldn't you want the world to remember? This is a new way of remembering. It's been a long time and people forget. I get so angry when I see this image, and not toward the artist, but toward those who would prefer we forget. Let her make art. And may her art force a remembering.
17
As a white male who is very concerned about issues of race, class and culture I have engaged in a number of discussions in recent months regarding who is responsible for furthering the dialogue on issues of racism. My African American friends have suggested that it is not their responsibility to educate the rest of us on how to behave. That we should then criticize a white female artist for reminding us of the horror of Emmitt Till's assasination just doesn't sit right with me.
I am also a jazz musician and popular music historian who holds the African American history of Jazz in the highest reverence but I still participate in the creation of jazz and have been encouraged to do so by virtually all of my musician friends who are also politically aware of many of these same issues.
I am reminded of being invited to sit in with legendary bassist Milt Hinton many years ago when I was a student at Hunter College where he taught. Race was not an issue although Milt lived thru Jim Crow and was literally one of the inventors of modern jazz bass playing.
Cultural Appropiation is usually defined as taking or appropriating aspects of someone elses culture and claiming it as your own. As far as I can tell this painting was created to tell a story that needs to be told and from my perspective the fact that a white female artist created this powerful work is more good than bad. I will still listen to people of color who may differ but this is the way I see it.
I am also a jazz musician and popular music historian who holds the African American history of Jazz in the highest reverence but I still participate in the creation of jazz and have been encouraged to do so by virtually all of my musician friends who are also politically aware of many of these same issues.
I am reminded of being invited to sit in with legendary bassist Milt Hinton many years ago when I was a student at Hunter College where he taught. Race was not an issue although Milt lived thru Jim Crow and was literally one of the inventors of modern jazz bass playing.
Cultural Appropiation is usually defined as taking or appropriating aspects of someone elses culture and claiming it as your own. As far as I can tell this painting was created to tell a story that needs to be told and from my perspective the fact that a white female artist created this powerful work is more good than bad. I will still listen to people of color who may differ but this is the way I see it.
69
Mr. Appell,
More than any other comment here, yours spoke to me. Tremendously balanced and thoughtful. Thank you.
More than any other comment here, yours spoke to me. Tremendously balanced and thoughtful. Thank you.
1
It seems to me that art's purpose is to make us reflect and think. If this painting did just that then it has been successful. Obviously it touched many "nerves" throughout our society and that, I believe, is a good thing. Each of us will take away from it something unique to ourselves, based on our life experiences. It doesn't matter what color you are, if you are a thinking person you will be affected in some way. Furthermore, this is a story that needs to be re-told to a society that has forgotten how many inhumane actions were visited upon black people (and still are). I am old enough to remember and I am white.
30
Raw Photograph emerges as Oil Painting. Transformative. Taking the Hideous Dreadful as a Subject of Art. No problem there. The Black woman who stood in front to prevent a photo in protest. A reflection on Why is worthy. So is Ms. Schutz's Oil. Call it The Alchemy of Art. Beauty & the Beast.
1
"Censorship is to art as lynching is to justice."
--Henry Louis Gates
--Henry Louis Gates
17
More than almost any action in the past 50 years, this painting has brought attention to the meaning of Emmett Till's life and death. That is good.
12
It seems like steering the conversation toward the artist's appropriation of the image as a measure of her privilege is drastically hijacking the message of the open casket photo.
7
The New Normal: Artists censor artists.
Who are these people?
I lived in Washington when bigots closed the Mapplethorpe exhibition because his work offended their bourgeois sensibilities.
This is a similar travesty, bourgeois artists now in the haters role once occupied by Jesse Helms.
"There has been the quiet action of a young black artist standing in front of the painting to block public view in something of a protest-as-performance." You say this as though it's acceptable to intentionally obstruct art in a museum. If he's an 'artist' he can make his own work addressing his concerns without obstructing Schutz's work.
The protesters have called for the painting to be removed & destroyed. Who believes they have the right to demand the destruction of artwork because they don't approve of it? Fascists. No one should demand art satisfy their petty political concerns. Even the fascist Helms didn't demand the destruction of Mapplethorpe's work.
Trying to make Schutz a scapegoat for centuries of white exploitation of blacks is cynical & earning Hannah Black publicity money can't buy. It would be constructive for Black to focus her rage on Donald Trump, who has the ability & intention to harm millions of black lives. Black's just using Dana Schutz to make a name for herself.
Those demonizing Schutz because their particular unique sensibilities are offended are deeply cynical.
The Philistines are mounting an attack on art in the name of "racism."
Resist.
Who are these people?
I lived in Washington when bigots closed the Mapplethorpe exhibition because his work offended their bourgeois sensibilities.
This is a similar travesty, bourgeois artists now in the haters role once occupied by Jesse Helms.
"There has been the quiet action of a young black artist standing in front of the painting to block public view in something of a protest-as-performance." You say this as though it's acceptable to intentionally obstruct art in a museum. If he's an 'artist' he can make his own work addressing his concerns without obstructing Schutz's work.
The protesters have called for the painting to be removed & destroyed. Who believes they have the right to demand the destruction of artwork because they don't approve of it? Fascists. No one should demand art satisfy their petty political concerns. Even the fascist Helms didn't demand the destruction of Mapplethorpe's work.
Trying to make Schutz a scapegoat for centuries of white exploitation of blacks is cynical & earning Hannah Black publicity money can't buy. It would be constructive for Black to focus her rage on Donald Trump, who has the ability & intention to harm millions of black lives. Black's just using Dana Schutz to make a name for herself.
Those demonizing Schutz because their particular unique sensibilities are offended are deeply cynical.
The Philistines are mounting an attack on art in the name of "racism."
Resist.
18
There have been very intelligent words written on Mapplethorpe's "use" of black bodies.
Me thinks the protests are trying to reach the inner artist sanctum of Schutz and have her realize the failure of the work and destroy it herself.
Plenty of precedent with artists taking such action.
Me thinks the protests are trying to reach the inner artist sanctum of Schutz and have her realize the failure of the work and destroy it herself.
Plenty of precedent with artists taking such action.
1
I cannot be black. But I relate to black American artists, especially women like Toni Morrison, more than any others. The story of Emmett Till is a deeply human story. And we cannot censor the human in art. This painting reminds me of Kathe Kollwitz' The Scream. Please don't try to take the experience of race in America away from any of us. It separates us and makes us less human. Good art is universal.
13
Kathe Kollwitz, The Scream?
https://www.wikiart.org/en/kathe-kollwitz
The Scream, Edvard Munch?? (1893)
https://www.wikiart.org/en/kathe-kollwitz
The Scream, Edvard Munch?? (1893)
2
Christopher Benson's important addition to the extensive critical reception around Schutz's painting is the call to education and engagement while emphasizing a responsibility the Whitney Museum has in this "teachable moment." Displaying the painting in this institutional context is not enough. Indeed, I look forward to specific efforts by the Whitney Museum curators, and Schutz herself, to now provide generous conditions for open engagement, critical reflection, and further dialogue--efforts that recognize what it means to imagine this deep violence and Mrs. Till-Mobley's care for the memory of that violence.
1
With influential people like Sean Hannity complaining that TWELVE YEARS AS A SLAVE shouldn't have been made and that he is sick of white shaming - this is an important painting.
8
If we deem it inappropriate for white artists to depict black subject matter, then should we object to black artists addressing white subjects? Should Jews have exclusive rights to artistic treatment of the Holocaust? I have always thought that a virtue of the arts is their universality.
19
The controversy over Dana Schutz's painting reminded me that In 1990 at the Brooklyn Museum I saw an exhibition called, Facing History, The Black Image in American Art 1710-1940, curated by Guy McElroy, a young black art historian. He included works by black and white artists. Sadly, Mr. McElroy died of a pulmonary embolism that same year.
Mr. McElroy wrote in the catalogue that the show is ''clearly a statement about the politics of black life in American society,'' and he said one of his aims was to examine the ways in which the artists ''reinforced a number of largely restrictive stereotypes black identity.''
I can only speculate what he would make of Ms. Schutz's painting, but I don't think he would want it taken down.
Mr. McElroy wrote in the catalogue that the show is ''clearly a statement about the politics of black life in American society,'' and he said one of his aims was to examine the ways in which the artists ''reinforced a number of largely restrictive stereotypes black identity.''
I can only speculate what he would make of Ms. Schutz's painting, but I don't think he would want it taken down.
18
This is a really unfortunate and suspect debate. How can you slice and dice history so that one can only reference that which belongs to its particular time and place and ethnicity? We are all members of the human race. There's no way we can avoid seeing things through our own filters, but that's what art is all about--the ability to see the universal in the individual. If the artists who are protesting the painting do not understand this, then they are not artists at all.
33
The controversy regarding the public display of the painting shows questions about Race in US society have become a psychic maze. Whatever motive for dealing with a racial topic, there will be detractors and virulent critics. Even what may be offered as sympathetic representations will be attacked on some basis. Who has the right to represent racial violence in America? Anyone who is a member of US society has a right, it is part of our collective history as a society. Arguing about where the privilege resides is a game of false authority. Arguing about who has the right to comment on hate is to continue that hate. Is it callow for a rich white artist to make a rarified abstracted painting of racial violence? Yes, and they probably know so themselves. Is the painting a weak curatorial choice for an art exhibition in a public museum? Mostly. Unless the point is to display how even the most insulated, privileged strata of the White Order have been affected by racial violence, and feel compelled to treat it in some way. The fact the artist says the painting ( possibly worth a great deal of money ) will not be sold, is just a moral dodge. Does protesting the painting by someone who is ‘racially appropriate’ provide a useful counterpoint? Or is it opportunism? The high end commercial art gallery world is full of artists who have ridden their social typifications to success. In the high end commercial art gallery and museum world there aren’t really any clean, altruistic motives.
9
This is such a complicated issue because those original photographs and courage and utter heart break for Mamie Till-Mobley was such a huge factor in moving America forward in the Civil Rights Movement. Plus - seeing the real image in contrast to a re-imaging is a profound difference and the impact is very different. Without having first seen the original photographs how does it impact on viewing the painting as a second hand source? Can the painting be separated from the original and still have the same effect on the viewer? The painting, at least for me, cannot be separated from the Jackson photographs because that image is imprinted on me and that is powerful force that carries over onto the painting.
The other highly complex question surrounding my reactions to the story of this brutal yet pivotal event is how it forced changes in our nation. I found myself thinking again about Sandy Hook and how this nation utterly has failed those victims as well. At the time I kept asking myself if all Americans were forced to see the bodies of all those children, as we were with Emmett Till would those images have galvanized the movement to force the gun rules and sales? Like the reality of the Emmett Till coffin photographs forced the world to look into the face and life of this beautiful child and his mother - would the photos of Sandy Hook have the same effect for change?
I don't have the answer but we know his death brought changes.
The other highly complex question surrounding my reactions to the story of this brutal yet pivotal event is how it forced changes in our nation. I found myself thinking again about Sandy Hook and how this nation utterly has failed those victims as well. At the time I kept asking myself if all Americans were forced to see the bodies of all those children, as we were with Emmett Till would those images have galvanized the movement to force the gun rules and sales? Like the reality of the Emmett Till coffin photographs forced the world to look into the face and life of this beautiful child and his mother - would the photos of Sandy Hook have the same effect for change?
I don't have the answer but we know his death brought changes.
4
Misplaced effort to honor him it seems. The art is great and appreciated, but not likely to be seen as effective way to honor a brave young man.
1
Insensitivity isn't a crime. But would Dana Schutz want me to paint her mother's death? The crime is in all the assumptions driving both ends of the debate: a privileged white thinking she can portray something that eviscerated the emotions of the African American community. Another white thinking she has the sensitivity to impart another white insight into the 300 year-history of our nation's slavery.
There's something called sacred at the heart of this: the right to express oneself and emotions, and the right of another to cry No! when someone else starts poking around in their most private heart.
Emmett revealed the vileness of our nation's racism.
Schultz the insensitivity of those who have never experienced the horror they think they can articulate.
There's something called sacred at the heart of this: the right to express oneself and emotions, and the right of another to cry No! when someone else starts poking around in their most private heart.
Emmett revealed the vileness of our nation's racism.
Schultz the insensitivity of those who have never experienced the horror they think they can articulate.
4
“She has the right to make that work,” suggests John Jennings, professor of media and culture at the University of California, Riverside. “But it supplants the mother’s very brave act of showing us the body.”
Nonsense. No painting will ever `supplant' the heroism shown by Mrs. Till-Mobley.
Nonsense. No painting will ever `supplant' the heroism shown by Mrs. Till-Mobley.
17
I can't fully understand the anguish and anger this painting has provoked; as a white person, I'll never know what it feels like to have hundreds of years of oppression as my family's history. I don't agree with censorship or art or speech, but I can still be sensitive to a Black person feeling that yet again, a white person is trying make money on the suffering and bodies (depicted or real) of a person of color. That feeling of powerlessness--when any of us feel it, regardless of why--induces rage, and *that* is something most of us have felt and don't wish upon others.
5
Let's not forget the recent confession by the "backwoods Marilyn Monroe" she was lying through her teeth when she said he came onto her and held her. And let's not forget up through the 60's 433 men were executed for rape (this ignores the lynchings), 432 were blacks, another 6 were other men of color, Native American, Hispanic, or Asian, and only one was white. In a statistical miracle for all those unfamiliar with American culture, not one man was ever executed for raping a black woman--all the "victims" were white. How many of those men executed for rape men were actually guilty--we will never know since at a minimum there was no DNA testing. Today the courts still allow men to be charged and convicted on the mere basis of eyewitness ID--recall the recent case of the Stanford swimmer. Obviously to any person such as myself who was a court reporter eyewitness ID is ridiculous, the standard joke was, "I was there I saw it. Next!" Is it not time to pony up to science and demand no DNA, no rape charge?
2
Does it matter if the white artist accurately displays the black experience? Are we so consumed with identity politics that we can't even attempt to understand each other? That we can't write about each other? Paint each other? Try to empathize with each other? Oh, that's right, we seem to be already doing that pretty well.
12
When Mamie Till-Mobley bravely decided to make the grotesque sight of her bludgeoned son public, she was doing the opposite of what was expected of her. Under most circumstances, a parent of a murdered and mangled child would choose to show the world an image of unblemished youth as a way to counter the force of a violently tragic end. But Emmett Till's mother knew the best chance for her son to have a meaningful life on earth – after his death – was to uncover the full ugly extent of evil that had visited him when he was 14. Publishing the photo of Emmett's disfigured corpse in Jet Magazine made sure that her son did not die in vain. His influence on the world has been immeasurable. The photo was highly controversial in its day, and it is still more powerful today than Dana Schutz's painting. Racial appropriation once meant either an insulting parody of African-Americans (black-face) or an appreciative copy of African-American art that, despite respectful intentions, managed to rob those Black artists of the profits and fame due to them (early rock 'n roll.) Schutz's painting does neither. The only way this particular painting could do harm was if the Whitney refused the work of African-Americans, or demanded that African-American artists merely showed work about African-American life. On the other hand, in a nation as fraught as ours, and in such dismal political and social shape is ours, such controversies are probably inevitable.
5
The painting is not an iconic representation of a person whose death had a profound impact upon the history of black people in the U.S., it's image of a human being so badly mutilated as to be unrecognizable, mutilated by other human beings who deliberately tried to make the corpse not resemble anyone. What it depicted leaves the imagination to derive the universal meaning from the known context. It takes the experience of this teenager's misfortune and makes the viewer understand that he was the victim of people who sought to not just take his life but to eliminate his personal appearance. We understand that his killers' wanted to destroy all aspects of his person, his humanity, and that they were savage human beings.
10
Beyond the bad taste of this so-called artist, what is incredible is that the Whitney have hanged such "work" which involves the negation of any artistic skill : a poor handling of primary colors, no intent whatsoever about composition, etc. We still have the Academic canon established by such 'intellectual critics of the Cold War: a spy, Clement Greenberg; and a guy working for the propaganda Cold War genius Repplier, Harold Rosenberg. If this lady did not take advantage of such tragic subject, she would not artistically exist.
3
This thoughtful piece, by a (apparently) black academic nonetheless left me unmoved. I believe the painting would have been unobjectionable, and likely a valuable contribution, had Mrs. Till-Mobley lived to give her permission. But she did not, and a white painter should not just take that image - the corpse of a young black man brutally murdered and mutilated by white racists - solely on her own authority. Indeed, through its appropriation, the painting detracts from, rather than improves, the debate by adding to injury and inflaming passions.
(Mr.) Dylan's "The Ballad of Emmett Till" differs in that it is the voice of Dylan, speaking about his (Dylan's) reactions and perceptions. By contrast, a conceit of painting is the absence of the painter, and thus the painting is more akin to a performance piece in which a white performer impersonates the dead Emmett Till, with fake blood and other makeup, which I believe most reasonable people would consider entirely inappropriate, and many - myself included - would consider intensely disagreeable.
I would also recommend listening to the radio broadcast of Dylan's ballad; while I find the song itself acceptable, I found the discussion of special chords, fine singing and other matters singularly unrelated to young Mr. Till's cruel murder jarring and disappointing. While Dylan appeared sincerely dismayed by the murder, he also seemed to feel it provided a fine opportunity to advance his career, which was (again) disagreeable.
(Mr.) Dylan's "The Ballad of Emmett Till" differs in that it is the voice of Dylan, speaking about his (Dylan's) reactions and perceptions. By contrast, a conceit of painting is the absence of the painter, and thus the painting is more akin to a performance piece in which a white performer impersonates the dead Emmett Till, with fake blood and other makeup, which I believe most reasonable people would consider entirely inappropriate, and many - myself included - would consider intensely disagreeable.
I would also recommend listening to the radio broadcast of Dylan's ballad; while I find the song itself acceptable, I found the discussion of special chords, fine singing and other matters singularly unrelated to young Mr. Till's cruel murder jarring and disappointing. While Dylan appeared sincerely dismayed by the murder, he also seemed to feel it provided a fine opportunity to advance his career, which was (again) disagreeable.
3
There is no difference between Dylan's song and this work. They are both white people depicting the horror of what happened to a young boy.
There is nothing wrong with that. Nobody sensible would claim that a white person's reaction to something like that is the same as a black person's. But it doesn't mean they can't find it horrifying, too, and expressing that is what art is.
There is nothing wrong with that. Nobody sensible would claim that a white person's reaction to something like that is the same as a black person's. But it doesn't mean they can't find it horrifying, too, and expressing that is what art is.
9
I'm not keen on political art, and although I could be wrong, I think I smell a whiff of opportunism on the part of the artist and the Whitney.
But neither am I a censor.
Is it a good painting? Yes, in a graduate-school way. Good chops, as they say. Good paint handling.
In terms of process, the painting is of course appropriated from a photo, that method being quite the thing these years. For myself, I regret that the artist, if she wanted to make a statement about racism, didn't engage her imagination beyond borrowing from existing imagery.
But neither am I a censor.
Is it a good painting? Yes, in a graduate-school way. Good chops, as they say. Good paint handling.
In terms of process, the painting is of course appropriated from a photo, that method being quite the thing these years. For myself, I regret that the artist, if she wanted to make a statement about racism, didn't engage her imagination beyond borrowing from existing imagery.
2
The lack of respect for artistic freedom, and grasp of social nuance in people who oppose the paintings display is unfortunate. They should embrace artistic freedom and understand that the imposition of limits, is exactly what the murderers of Emmett Till wanted to do. Artistic freedom is the mortal enemy of the American Apartheid that was 1950's Mississippi. When Emmett Till's mother chose to leave his coffin open, that searing image belonged to all America. The "medium is the message", the fact that the Dana Schutz painting exists celebrates the courage of Emmett's mother, and strikes a powerful blow against the racist mentality that murdered him.
7
Those who felt moved to protest are certainly entitled to express their opinions but I find them completely barren. Race is an artificial category with a reality that hinges exclusively on the prejudicial beliefs of individuals.
The pain and injustice of racial discrimination is certainly real but the foundations of those beliefs are complete illusion or, more accurately - pretext fundamental to the pursuit of self-serving economic advantage in the form of chattel slavery and, after the Civil War, Jim Crow exploitation. These protests give backhanded credence to that whole constellation of illusory pretext.
This is particularly the case in America. The rape of black women by white men has left a living legacy where the difference between black and white is an insane and arbitrary absurdity.
The fundamental question today is not what race are you are but which side are you on. Was Picasso's Guernica (named after the terror bombing of a Basque city of the same name) memorable art because it was painted by a Basque artist? No - as a matter of fact Picasso was Andalusian.
The pain and injustice of racial discrimination is certainly real but the foundations of those beliefs are complete illusion or, more accurately - pretext fundamental to the pursuit of self-serving economic advantage in the form of chattel slavery and, after the Civil War, Jim Crow exploitation. These protests give backhanded credence to that whole constellation of illusory pretext.
This is particularly the case in America. The rape of black women by white men has left a living legacy where the difference between black and white is an insane and arbitrary absurdity.
The fundamental question today is not what race are you are but which side are you on. Was Picasso's Guernica (named after the terror bombing of a Basque city of the same name) memorable art because it was painted by a Basque artist? No - as a matter of fact Picasso was Andalusian.
7
It is absolutely appalling that Dana Schutz should be submitted to this kind of racist garbage. You know, because you're black doesn't mean you have the exclusive right to the crucifix; and, no, you can't just say whitey should back off because no whitey has a clue about suffering. Do you really want to look back at just the last 2000 years or so, and actually say that slavery is the only big thing that's gone wrong? Nothing else compares? Really? Auschwitz was all blacks? Do you really need the catalogue of the other few hundreds of millions of dead whities, since you already have it, and apparently are incapable of reading it, much less apparently caring one way or another? Anyway, Emmett Till suffered what I think should rightly be called a martyrdom, and Dana Schutz powerfully expressed her understanding of that; for which I at least think she deserves all praise.
8
It's solidarity kitsch.
1
Three cheers for Ms Schutz. With this painting and the discussions that it has evoked, she has hit the high mark of art: she, and her detractors have made us think. Ms Schutz painting, and her detractors, have solidly hit me to the bottom of my being. Thank you all.
5
Honestly, if you showed that painting to anyone without telling them what it was, people would probably be able to identify it as a human in a suit and not much more. Nobody, looking at the abstract paint splotches, would immediately say the artist is ripping off the image of Emmett Till.
So I don't think this is as big a deal as everyone's making it out to be. The beating and murder of Emmett Till was horrible, and a pivotal episode in civil rights. But this painting is unimpressive, and within a year it will be pretty much forgotten.
So I don't think this is as big a deal as everyone's making it out to be. The beating and murder of Emmett Till was horrible, and a pivotal episode in civil rights. But this painting is unimpressive, and within a year it will be pretty much forgotten.
2
Having seen the painting and having followed Schutz's work I found it, too, to favor her facility for expressive paint handling over the subject who you would not identify without a title. I would have hoped the presentation of such a subject would be of epic scale and yet while not intimate it was nevertheless one of the smallest paintings by this artist I have seen. She did not do justice to Till's memory.
3
Emmett Till's open casket photo changed my mother's thinking on racism forever. She was white. born in '24, and she never had any real interaction with African-Americans when Emmett died in '55. The photo opened her heart/mind to Mrs. Till's unspeakable grief. She passed this along to her children.
Twain wrote about Jim crying and missing his family in Huck Finn. Huck hears Jim crying one night. He realizes Jim is hurting inside. He expands his thinking.
Sonya Clark and Willie Cole can open anyone up to new thinking as well.
This painting may open someone's heart/mind about racism despite who painted it. I hope so.
Twain wrote about Jim crying and missing his family in Huck Finn. Huck hears Jim crying one night. He realizes Jim is hurting inside. He expands his thinking.
Sonya Clark and Willie Cole can open anyone up to new thinking as well.
This painting may open someone's heart/mind about racism despite who painted it. I hope so.
17
I've never been the most knowledgeable person about art or it's purpose but saying any artist doesn't have a right to make a statement through their art about such an important issue because of the color of their skin?
That seems to go well past ironic.
That seems to go well past ironic.
11
The main "issue" in this story and in this painting is that the artist is a white person. How is that not racist?
5
Whether its a good painting or a bad painting is purely subjective. It's the freedom of expression that is important. We should all be allowed to 'draw' our own conclusions
9
If the artist begins to worry about the opinions of her audience or the attention the work may or may not receive....or worry about the merit of the art, then the art is already compromised.
9
If my memory serves me well, I believe Emmett Till's mother insisted on an open casket saying, "So all the world can see what they did to my little boy." I take no issue with a contemporary iteration/interpretation of the violence done to Emmett Till's body. The terrible image(s) belong to no one; they speak to the violence, and failings of our judicial system that we all bare responsibility to reject. Good for the museum, and the artist. One can only hope the public understands too.
158
The picture puts a harsh truth on public display that millions of Americans are still unwilling to deal with; and should remain on display until every last man, woman and child in this country has had an opportunity to get a good searching look at it.
114
I don't think Emmett Till's story is exclusively African-American. A White woman pointed her finger and lied about him and White men tortured and murdered him. White people have been avoiding ownership of White participation in Emmett's story for decades.
My issue is that I think the artist used Emmett Till's corpse to attract attention to her really bad painting. I don't think Mrs. Mobley would be very happy about that. In fact, since Mrs. Mobley never minced words, she'd probably have a few choice ones for this 'artist'. She's probably saying them right now, in heaven.
This is nothing new. White people have been using Black people's bodies to benefit themselves for centuries.
My issue is that I think the artist used Emmett Till's corpse to attract attention to her really bad painting. I don't think Mrs. Mobley would be very happy about that. In fact, since Mrs. Mobley never minced words, she'd probably have a few choice ones for this 'artist'. She's probably saying them right now, in heaven.
This is nothing new. White people have been using Black people's bodies to benefit themselves for centuries.
13
"... her [Schutz's] really bad painting."
What makes Schutz's painting "really bad"? What are some examples of "really" good paintings?
What makes Schutz's painting "really bad"? What are some examples of "really" good paintings?
8
The artist had no guarantee that the work would be shown, much less that Schutz would profit from it.
There is a long tradition of "political" art. It goes back to medieval portrayals of atrocities, to Daumier and Goya, Picasso and Ben Shahn.
I don't think much of the painting itself. It feels too "easy." But that's another issue, isn't it?
There is a long tradition of "political" art. It goes back to medieval portrayals of atrocities, to Daumier and Goya, Picasso and Ben Shahn.
I don't think much of the painting itself. It feels too "easy." But that's another issue, isn't it?
2
@laura174
When did Mrs. Mobley become an art critic? Dana Schutz was an artist before she received notice because of "Open Casket," so is it really fair to pretend that Ms. Schutz is "using" Emmett Till? In fact, only when all Americans recognize that and other lynchings as part of American history can we make progress towards becoming the America promised in the U.S. Constitution.
When did Mrs. Mobley become an art critic? Dana Schutz was an artist before she received notice because of "Open Casket," so is it really fair to pretend that Ms. Schutz is "using" Emmett Till? In fact, only when all Americans recognize that and other lynchings as part of American history can we make progress towards becoming the America promised in the U.S. Constitution.
1
Is the standard for displaying art in a museum now what the subject's mother would think of a piece? Can the painting only be appropriate to display if no one is offended, or no one close to the depicted victim anguished by the artistic expression?
94
No, it never has been. Just, in this instance, due to people's sense of empathy, it's something they choose to consider.
1
Excellent points.
2
We are so far removed from 1955, and so close. But we might remember that lynching was, among other things, an expression of white people's refusal to see black suffering, or to imagine our shared humanity. If white people are now struggling to do just that, who would want to condemn them for it? We should honor the victims of the past by making a better world, by fighting against violence & inequality, by creating bits of identity & experience that we share. Not by drawing lines of moral authority & "ownership.". There's more important work to be done.
82
Regarding art as a vehicle for social justice
in a perfectly just society, there would be no art
good to know
=
in a perfectly just society, there would be no art
good to know
=
7
I don't think this is about this artist's "right" to create whatever art she likes. It's also not about censorship. This is about an acknowledgment that art does not exist independent of the artist. The world of "high art" is a white world, and this white expressions of black pain is celebrated when black expressions of black pain are not. Most black people will never even walk into the Whitney to see this, so the question is not only who made the art but who was the art made for. Mamie Till allowed the photo to be used in a black periodical for black eyes. This white artist has now appropriated what is a black image for the private consumption of non-black people. References to ET in songs are not the same. It's the image that matters.
11
It's pretty condescending to conclude that "most black people will never even walk into the Whitney to see this," and so to imply that black people cannot appreciate art.
As a matter of fact, most white people will never see it, either. The audience that appreciates art has never been in the majority, regardless of race.
As an artist who has artist friends of all races, I find your post insulting.
As a matter of fact, most white people will never see it, either. The audience that appreciates art has never been in the majority, regardless of race.
As an artist who has artist friends of all races, I find your post insulting.
20
LBC: "This white artist has now appropriated what is a black image for the private consumption of non-black people."
The painting is being displayed in PUBLIC, so that is nonsense. Do you imagine "non-black people" are buying "Open Casket" postcards for "private consumption" at home?
The painting is being displayed in PUBLIC, so that is nonsense. Do you imagine "non-black people" are buying "Open Casket" postcards for "private consumption" at home?
10
Would it help to know that the work of black artist Henry Taylor is also shown at the Whitney biennial, a painting of the death of Philando Castile, no less? Thank you to schbrg, below, for the link that brought this to my attention.
https://static01.nyt.com/images/2017/03/17/arts/17BIENNIAL2/17BIENNIAL2-...
https://static01.nyt.com/images/2017/03/17/arts/17BIENNIAL2/17BIENNIAL2-...
3
Imagine looking at the painting, but not knowing the race of the artist. Then judge the art. Art stands apart from its maker. This painting recognizes the tragedy of Emmett Till, it causes us to mourn his murder again and to constantly remember the injustices of racism. I respect the right of people to protest this painting's inclusion in the Whitney show, but I think remembering and honoring Emmett Till is more important. The artist says she has no intention of selling this painting or profiting from it.
69
You have "beveled" this nicely Darcy. Only in the freshness -- nay! -- the newness of this Dawn's light could I have found again your insight.
I don't know. But sometimes I wonder if this strict delineation, this appropriation, this hands off attitude black to white and vise versa isn't part of what gave rise to Trump and his followers. I don't know.
57
Artists create, which is often difficult, painful and full of risk. I encourage Ms. Schutz and other artists, scientists, dreamers and creators to stand up to the destroyers and critics who, with little risk and effort of their own, would suck the life out of our efforts to understand our world.
64
What risks do artists, in this country specifically, take? Risks of being ignored or ridiculed? When was the last artist murdered for their work in the USA?
1
Right on. Agree.
1
I'm sorry, the event and its imagery have a cultural history, trajectory, significance, and life of their own. No one "owns" the death image of Emmett Till any more than anyone "owns" the death and iconography of any great historical figure -- from Jesus to JFK.
80
The first thing that came to my mind when I read the original coverage of Schut's painting was of Mamie Till-Mobley, and her insistence that her child's casket remain open. She did that for a reason, and here we are, remembering. And recognizing that there are people who would like to turn back the clock on much of the progress that has been made in the concept that equality means everyone. Good people still have to stand together against those who would oppress 'others' by any means. Right and wrong don't have a color.
86
As a survivor of a hundred marches, arm in arm with people of all colors, I am truly saddened that this is even taken seriously as a subject.
James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner were murdered in Mississippi in 1964 by white supremacists. Should there be two separate statues to them, one for Whites, and one for Blacks, in different parts of town? Tom Paxton wrote a beautiful song to their memory. Should he have written a song for Goodman and Schwerner, and let Taj Mahal write the one for Jim Chaney? Or did they, in fact, die so that this type of division should be erased from our culture?
Not only is racism alive and well in this country, but it seems to be sprouting wings.
Yes, if only we could as Till's Mother, and then ask MLK, Ali, Robeson, or Malcolm. I think I know what they would have answered, but we all have to find it out for ourselves.
James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner were murdered in Mississippi in 1964 by white supremacists. Should there be two separate statues to them, one for Whites, and one for Blacks, in different parts of town? Tom Paxton wrote a beautiful song to their memory. Should he have written a song for Goodman and Schwerner, and let Taj Mahal write the one for Jim Chaney? Or did they, in fact, die so that this type of division should be erased from our culture?
Not only is racism alive and well in this country, but it seems to be sprouting wings.
Yes, if only we could as Till's Mother, and then ask MLK, Ali, Robeson, or Malcolm. I think I know what they would have answered, but we all have to find it out for ourselves.
191
Absolutely, as a Freedom Rider I did not commit myself to the fight to end segregation only to be confronted with a conflict between white images and black images fifty-five years later. We rode together. Some of us died together. And we sang together, "black and white together, we will overcome".
38
So many of white topical songwriters in the 1960s wrote songs for Goodman, Schwerner and Chaney--Phil Ochs, for example. But isn't it disgraceful that James Chaney's grave is the only one that is so constantly vandalized that it's had to be fortified with steel bracing? It proves, once again, that racism is alive and well and living in the U.S., and, as you say, sprouting wings.
Tom Paxton is STILL singing those songs, as are many in the folk music world. It's imperative that we continue to lock arms and sing together. It's not just a "kumbaya" moment; it's our very lives we're fighting for. We don't have to go overseas to fight for freedom. The fight is right here, in our backyard.
Tom Paxton is STILL singing those songs, as are many in the folk music world. It's imperative that we continue to lock arms and sing together. It's not just a "kumbaya" moment; it's our very lives we're fighting for. We don't have to go overseas to fight for freedom. The fight is right here, in our backyard.
I don't think one viewpoint is any less important than the other in the scheme of things. Exhibiting a painting of a murdered African American male by a white artist adds another dimension to the dialogue, and the controversy over it has broadened our awareness (mine as a white male) of what great strides need to be made in terms of white people's participation and support of the struggle against the malignant presence of racism and intolerance.
It is more poignant an issue to given the heinous immigration policies of our current President, as well as his flaccid attitude toward police violence against African Americans.
It is more poignant an issue to given the heinous immigration policies of our current President, as well as his flaccid attitude toward police violence against African Americans.
24
Excellent user ID
17
Why is Mr. Benson speaking for Ms. Till-Mobley? He can't know what is in another's person mind. In this case, he can't even give an informed guess of what Ms. Till-Mobley wanted given he only spent six months with her.
If anyone wants to make art of Emmett Till's death, the gruesome photo is available and should suffice for those who consider it entertaining. You know who you are.
If anyone wants to make art of Emmett Till's death, the gruesome photo is available and should suffice for those who consider it entertaining. You know who you are.
13
I think spending six months with someone in intense person-to-person contact with the intention of hearing her story is more than sufficient time to justify an opinion about her desires.
3
Dana Schutz should be commended for attempting to talk about racial discrimination, bigotry, and violence. That said, re-mutilating the face of Emmett Till is probably not the best way of tackling this loaded subject. Thank you, Mr. Benson, for your thought-provoking and nuanced piece on this controversy.
4
At some level, it is true that a privileged actor who engages the cause of the oppressed always does so to further his or her own purpose. It is entirely appropriate to subject that purpose to examination. I worry, however, about the prima facie categorical disqualification of the privileged from engaging the subject matter of oppression. Those who seek to delegitimize Ms Schultz's image share the wall-building impulse of the current administration. I, for one, still prefer bridges.
44
The Bible's words are taken as our own even though culturally we are Martians to those long ago peoples. We paint the scenes, dance the dances, sing and chant in celebrations of a people long gone. We do it for heros and villians of ages past and will do it for future events and people. We do not ask long gone ancestors permission for our interpretations today.
The artist uses history and people as a jumping off point. No one owns history. Each nation and within that nation,artists will adopt, adapt, and adjust events to suit his or her own view. The art and artist stand on its own. Emmett Till's life and death is not explained in mid-century terms but moves forward to how this artist interprets it now.
The artist uses history and people as a jumping off point. No one owns history. Each nation and within that nation,artists will adopt, adapt, and adjust events to suit his or her own view. The art and artist stand on its own. Emmett Till's life and death is not explained in mid-century terms but moves forward to how this artist interprets it now.
21
Thank you for setting out the many issues at stake in this case. It reminds me of the protests to the Met Opera's "Death of Klinghoffer" in 2014 which resulted in the opera being dropped from the worldwide HD broadcast. If I remember correctly a large part of that was fueled by Mr. Klinghoffer's daughters' objections to the work.
I cannot imagine the pain of losing a child or parent to racism and extremism but I do know I am informed and moved by great works of art to try and understand that pain. I do know that they can expand my horizons and try to empathize with others. I also believe that sparking that imaginative leap is one of art's vital roles, no matter the medium or the identity of the artist.
Debates like this actually focus publicity on these works or institutions that they may not otherwise enjoy. They are an important part of the discourse.
Personally I pray DJT leaves the National Endowment alone and allows us to all be moved or angered and continue to go wherever our imaginations and emotions take us.
I cannot imagine the pain of losing a child or parent to racism and extremism but I do know I am informed and moved by great works of art to try and understand that pain. I do know that they can expand my horizons and try to empathize with others. I also believe that sparking that imaginative leap is one of art's vital roles, no matter the medium or the identity of the artist.
Debates like this actually focus publicity on these works or institutions that they may not otherwise enjoy. They are an important part of the discourse.
Personally I pray DJT leaves the National Endowment alone and allows us to all be moved or angered and continue to go wherever our imaginations and emotions take us.
20
"We had averted our eyes far too long...People had to face my son....people had to face themselves," Mrs. Till wrote. That quote provided the central theme for my film, "Faces in the Water," at the Civil Rights Memorial Center, Southern Poverty Law Center, Montgomery, Alabama. It remains an imperative in America today.
19
It's all unfortunate. Those of us who were white, born in 1938 to well-off middle-class Republican parents and became Democrats,liberals, or would-be socialists, are now poor, dead, both, or sick at heart and soul because we are widowed AND poor AND there is a change of guard in the Whilte House. My spouse had a very tender heart; I am glad she/he is dead only because he/she died before Mr. Trump was "elected."
10
Obamacare will be repealed and replaced with something much better the very hour Donald Trump is sworn in. Is that one of the lies you're talking about? Because there are already scores of them on the record from the current so-called president. What does that make his supporters?
1
Jet did not even put it on the COVER... and how much money in advertising revenues (from companies who have monetize Jim Crow for generations)that this particular issue generated for Johnson Publications
went to Emmett Tills Mom .. A big part of what is "American" Injustice tragedy = everyone gets paid but the victims 95% of the time get the smaller amount
went to Emmett Tills Mom .. A big part of what is "American" Injustice tragedy = everyone gets paid but the victims 95% of the time get the smaller amount
1
It's difficult finding the words to adequately shame and criticize those protesting Dana Schutz's "right" to create and exhibit art. Racism, stupidity and anti-free speech Nazi spring to mind.
If you're looking for part of the explanation of the election of the horrid Trumpster, look no further than these left wing identity politics neo-Nazis; they embrace Trump's ideas at the ends of the horseshoe.
If you're looking for part of the explanation of the election of the horrid Trumpster, look no further than these left wing identity politics neo-Nazis; they embrace Trump's ideas at the ends of the horseshoe.
55
I link to what is, by far, the most clear, fair, and comprehensive thinking I have read regarding Schutz's work and arguments regarding its exhibitions, written by Coco Fusco, an artist. Very rewarding and fabulously well-written:
https://hyperallergic.com/368290/censorship-not-the-painting-must-go-on-...
https://hyperallergic.com/368290/censorship-not-the-painting-must-go-on-...
14
Thanks for the link. It was interesting.
2
Thank you for the link, which made me aware of Henry Taylor's painting of the death of Philando Castile.
Ms. Till-Mobley lost control of that image the moment she allowed it to be published. Using it in this context shows us that we can't congratulate ourselves on so much progress since Emmet's murder. That painting could be of any of the hundreds (if not thousands) of boys beaten to death because of their race since. I didn't know Ms. Till-Mobley, but I suspect that message is sufficiently in accord with the purpose behind her decision to publish her dead son's beaten body for her to approve. The race of the artist is your issue, not hers or ours.
51
If the painting is well-intended, avoids outright racism, and creates a teachable moment, then I think it succeeded.
39
I think it does succeed, and it succeeds because it is a good and informed work of art. The pillow around Mr Till's head evokes the sacred paintings of the Middle Ages and Renaissance, and her rendering of Mr Till's mutilated face seems informed by the sanguinary and disturbing work of Francis Bacon. Professor John Jennings's that the artist has supplanted Mrs Till-Mobley's act. I heartily disagree, the artist has supplemented Ms Till-Mobley's act and honored her bravery.
3
Hiding them away denies them
I agree with the Francis Bacon reference, that was showing horror without being explicit.
1
Emmett Till’s mother was courageous beyond words in allowing the world to see what racism did to her son. She was also telling everyone that no matter what they did to him, he was still her beloved son. An artistic rendering of her gesture is mild by comparison but welcome, because it’s obvious some Americans never seem to learn.
35
Thanks goodness Dana Schutz paints what moves her, regardless of the predictable polemics surely to follow. Has the world (Left and Right) gone mad for censorship? Paint on, Ms. Schutz! Your work matters.
108
If the colour of a person's skin makes a difference
of what they can and cannot paint then the "Racists" have won.
of what they can and cannot paint then the "Racists" have won.
175
Exactly!
14
Mr. Benson's comments are incisive and illuminate Ms. Till-Mobley's courage in the face of a racist outrage. But that doesn't change the outrage that we are debating artistic censorship. Not that the artist has done anything disrespectful: a white artist "appropriated" an image of a black person. That attempt at censorship is blatantly racist. We can't move past racism unless we are willing to condemn black racism as well as all the other varieties.
71
Bravo.
10
Art is not just agit-prop. It is not supposed to voice a party line. It doesn't belong to any single group.
63
"Supposed to" is what art chews and spits out, my man. What would you make of Guernica?
3
What an interesting example! Should we find that work of art objectionable because Picasso wasn't Basque?
10