Wednesday, 08 February 2012
is the artist a hater or a trickster? PDF Print E-mail
Written by David Swanson   
Friday, 30 March 2007 05:00
Just in time for Easter, an art gallery in New York City is showing Cosimo Cavallaro’s latest instillation, My Sweet Lord. There are a couple of things about the sculpture that strike me as a bit, uh, odd. First, when was the last time you saw a depiction of Jesus on the cross without at least a loin cloth to cover himself? And secondly, Cavallaro’s material of choice for his six foot tall crucifix is milk chocolate. Of course, this is the same guy who covered an entire Wyoming house in cheese.

Catholic League president Bill Donahue doesn’t seem real impressed,

As I’ve said many times before, Lent is the season for non-believers to sow seeds of doubt about Jesus. [This] however, is of a different genre: this is hate speech. And choosing Holy Week—the display opens on Palm Sunday and ends on Holy Saturday—makes it a direct in-your-face assault on Christians.

For Kester Brewin, author of The Complex Christ, My Sweet Lord brings back memories of the infamous Piss Christ. Brewin however, takes a very different view than the folks at the Catholic League,

I’ve obviously not seen the piece properly, but my sense is that it looks like a wonderfully cheeky critique of the saccharine nature of modern Easter-tide. It seems likely that the Catholic League are offended by Jesus’ penis being shown. Did he not have one? Would he not have been stripped naked to be crucified? Isn’t a loin cloth just a lie?

It seems again that those who seek to represent Christ in anything other than explicitly Christian and conservative works are going to find themselves heavily under attack. But, as in the work of Serrano, what I hope is happening is that these artists are playing the Trickster role that they ought, and are forcing us to re-evaluate our engagement with Christ over Easter.

I don’t think there’s any doubt My Sweet Lord causes the viewer to think and maybe even re-evaluate. The role of artist as trickster is intriguing and perhaps is what folks like Serrano and Cavallaro are up to. But before you take off to New York to see for yourself, I should probably mention that, according to Fox News today, the exhibit has been canceled. Seems it is easier to imagine the artist as a hater than a trickster.

TAGS: conservative , wonderfully , christians , engagement , explicitly , intriguing , saccharine , themselves , according , believers , 
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