Public Scholars at
Hanover College
Inquiries
Volume One, Number Three - Winter 2001
Debating the Future of Public Art
What is the social value of art? Should public funds be used to fund it? If so, how should this publicly-funded art be selected? Should public art reflect public values or the private inspiration of the artist? These questions and more were "on the table" at the Center for Free Inquiry Symposium entitled "Art, Society, and the Millennium: The Future of Public Art," held in March of 1999. Taking part in the three-day conversation were two of America's premier art critics, Jed Perl and Hilton Kramer; one of the fiercest critics of our current system of public art funding, Alice Goldfarb Marquis; and independent documentary film maker, B.J. Bullert.
As luck would have it, our symposium happened to coincide with the advent of the controversy over the opening of an exhibition entitled "Sensation" at the Brooklyn Museumof Art in New York. "Sensation," an exhibition of new British art that had drawn record-breaking crowds at the Royal Academy in London in 1997, was composed of works designed to be controversial. Damien Hirst, for instance, offered "The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living," a work 7ft. high, 17ft. long, and 7ft. wide that consists of the body of a tiger shark encased in glass and immersed in formaldehyde, and "Some Comfort Gained from the Acceptance of the Inherent Lies in Everything," a sliced brown cow cut in 12 sections each contained within a 7 ft. by 3 ft. by 1 ft. glass box filled with formaldehyde. But the piece that prompted Mayor Rudolf Giuliani to threaten to cut off all city funding to the Brooklyn Museum unless it canceled the exhibit was Chris Ofili's "The Holy Virgin Mary"-a work composed of materials that included elephant dung.
Public and press reaction to "Sensation," and to Mayor Giuliani's actions, demonstrated clearly that ordinary people are indeed passionate about the nexus of issues surrounding public art. That passion was equally evident in the heated exchanges that took place on the Hanover College campus during the two and a half days of the symposium. In this issue of Inquiries, we offer some of the views and observations of the symposium participants.
First, Jed Perl challenges us ponder the contradictions inherent in the concept of public art. Next, Alice Goldfarb Marquis shares some of her experiences and her ideas about what is wrong and what could be right with the funding of public art. Finally, B.J. Bullert shares some of her personal experience of the "Sensation" exhibit.
Jeffrey Brautigam
Jeffrey Brautigam is the Director of the Center for Free Inquiry at Hanover College, where he also teaches modern European history and the history of science.