In the gallery – comments – part 5

Tags

gallery, meta, photography, Poetry of Protest, protest, Resist

“The Poetry of Protest” our show in the Gallery of Art and Design at the University of Central Missouri of large prints of photographs from rallies, protests, marches, and demonstrations opened on September 26th.

We left an open notebook with blank pages and pencils on a podium next to the exhibit title wall. We get comments.

Thank you for hard work. A picture is worth a thousand words. Each and every photo is telling me stories.

Love the emotions displayed in these photographs.

Thank you for giving these people a voice on campus without even having to speak. A picture is worth 1,000 words!

The heart is there, but maybe add some other views. It would be more fair to represent the U.S. a whole.

Seriously? More fair? Corporations and billionaires aren’t out in the streets – they don’t have to be to get what they want.

We repeat ourselves:

1. “A gallery exhibit is not a vehicle for the ‘all opposing views are equal’ mantra in some circles of old media.”

2. “It would be impossible to cover and ‘show all sides of American protest’. Again, some protests were so minimal or obscure and there was no public notice. We’re not omniscient, nor do we claim to be…”

3. “Right wingnuts in America now have everything they’ve ever wanted – they control the Presidency, Congress, and the Supreme Court. For the most part they’re not in the streets protesting in any significant numbers…”

4. “Here’s the thing. You want a gallery show about those particular subjects? Go get a decent full frame camera, drive all over the state and the Midwest to cover these types of events, photograph them in some competent manner, make aesthetic choices about which images will work, start a discussion with a gallery over a period of two years, make numerous test prints on various papers, make the exhibit prints, and put the show up. Knock yourself out. But you won’t, will you? You’ll just complain about the unfairness of it all.”

5. “All art is biased.”

Thus endeth the lesson (for today).

Unpopular opinion: I don’t think Trump is Hitler 2.0

Wait, was it the Tiki torches, the raised arm salutes, or the swastikas that gave it away? Just asking.

There’s so much to unpack in just the first two words. Trump is unpopular, eh?

We don’t recall a single image in the exhibit labeling Donald Trump as “Hitler 2.0”.

From December, 2001:

Aaron McGruder, creator of “The Boondocks”

[….]

….I wanted to ask you specifically about the Thanksgiving strip where Huey compares President Bush to Osama bin Laden. Do you think that’s crossing the line on a holiday like that after a major tragedy such as Sept. 11?

A couple of things about that: One, I stole that joke from an Internet forward that was going around. I don’t even know who originated it. Two, the best thing about that strip is that it never says G.W. Bush. The reader has to make the connection. If the reader reads what I wrote and thinks about G.W. Bush, that means it’s fucking true! So I didn’t make it up; you came to the conclusion as well. And if it’s true, why are you mad at me? If he’s not all those things, then what are you mad at? (Laughs.)….

[….]

Hitler 2.0? We didn’t say it, you did.