On June 2, 2021, artists Dina Brodsky, Savannah Spirit, and Spencer Tunick hosted a conversation to share advice on how to tag, contextualize, or modify artwork on Instagram so as to improve its chances of not being removed. The webinar is part of Don't Delete Art, a gallery, resource center and campaign advocating for artistic freedom on social media. [...]
Artists and advocates have created the first comprehensive resource for artists to avoid and combat censorship on social media.
NCAC is asking the University of Kentucky (UK) to cancel recently announced plans to remove a 1930’s-era mural depicting aspects of Kentucky history, including slavery. Some students have demanded its removal because they consider it demeaning to people of color on campus. In 2018, the university commissioned an installation by Karyn Olivier, a noted Black artist, that was painted above [...]
On May 19, 2020, an international coalition of arts and free expression organizations, including the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC), IBEX Collection, Article19, PEN America’s Artists at Risk Connection (ARC), International Arts Rights Advisors, and Freemuse, launched Don’t Delete Art, a virtual gallery showcasing work which is banned or restricted on social media. The gallery, whose curators include frequently-censored artists [...]
The City of San Antonio censored queer Latina performance artist Xandra Ibarra's work addressing race and gender stereotypes, likely infringing on the First Amendment.
Pepperdine University is refusing to display an art student's works alongside her peers because the works depict nudity.
UPDATE: 10/24/19: On October 22, the DC Council voted unanimously to override Mayor Muriel Bowser's veto of an emergency bill that would have clarified the DCCAH’s independence. “The underlying legislation cemented DCCAH's separation from the executive's office after a tumultuous summer during which the mayor tried and failed to grab control of the District's public arts.” (see original post below) [...]
Svetlana Mintcheva, NCAC's Director of Programs, presented a talk at the Harvard Law School Library on the effects contemporary moral outrage has on the arts and culture.
NCAC proposes holding an open forum where GWHS students can talk about how they see and interpret the Arnautoff murals. We invite the San Francisco Board of Education to collaborate with us in presenting the forum.
The Jewish Community Center of San Francisco removed two works from its exhibition, La Frontera: Artists Respond to the U.S.-Mexico Border Crisis.
NCAC and artist Spencer Tunick created a nude art action in front of Facebook and Instagram's New York City headquarters as part of their #WeTheNipple campaign against art censorship on social media.
A discussion of what to do with the art of morally compromised artists, how morally compromised is "too" morally compromised, whether it matter if the artist is alive and, ultimately, who decides upon these issues of what is acceptable
A US-based Chinese artist was forced to remove three paintings from a show in North Carolina to avoid "offending" patrons.
The Port Authority of New York & New Jersey relocated an art installation depicting the Saudi Arabian flag after public complaints.
Image courtesy of Drew Kerr The National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) urges Queens Library to restore an exhibition of photographs it canceled and allow it to run for three weeks as originally planned. Drew Kerr’s exhibition, Faces of The 7 Train, consists of 32 black-and-white photographs that the artist shot of passengers on the 7 train over the course of [...]
On December 17th, Tumblr permanently banned adult content from its platform. Under the new community guidelines, any image that depicts sex acts, real-life human genitalia, or (with a few exceptions) female nipples will be hidden from public view. Despite the company’s claims, the new guidelines will not create a “better, more positive” Tumblr.
SMART TACTICS: Curating Difficult Content examines the internal and external pressures curators must navigate when considering potentially controversial material. Combining decades of advocacy experience with extensive interviews and curatorial surveys, this volume includes both a report on what happens behind the scenes in art institutions and a handbook for confronting the challenges of curating difficult content.
The National Coalition Against Censorship continues its support of student-led protests by extending the deadline for its protest-themed film contest to May 15th. This year’s contest invites aspiring teen filmmakers to create short films on the value of protest as an instrument of social change. In the weeks leading up to the March for Our Lives and National School Walkouts [...]
Artspace, the self-described "non-profit real estate developer for the arts," creates affordable live-work spaces in a world where such spaces are rapidly disappearing. However, on more than one occasion, Artspace has censored works exhibited by residents on their premises. The most recent incident occurred in East Minneapolis.
Sunset Park High School in Brooklyn, NY removed a work of student art last week after complaints that its message was offensive. NCAC opposes allowing a "hecker's veto" to chill this student's right to free expression.
After an artist was censored in Norfolk, VA, the public agency who shut down her show cancels all future art exhibitions.
If a recent policy change is not reversed, art by Guantanamo detainees may be permanently removed from public view when John Jay College's exhibition closes next week.
The National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) vehemently objects to the violation of the public’s right to access art by Guantanamo detainees and thus fully participate in the political conversation around Guantanamo. The new directive also violates the human rights of the detainees under international norms and further destruction of the work would impermissibly suppress documents of historical importance.
Johns Sims was finally able to present his work, "Confederate Flag: A Public Hanging", after years of forced adaptation and abridgment.
NCAC has issued a statement signed by several national and international organizations, opposing the Walker's decision to dismantle and destroy the controversial sculpture.
The play offers a perspective on the experience of growing up biracial -- or "mulatto," a dated term used to describe a person with one black and one white parent.
The decision to cancel the play was understandable, given the controversy around the photo, but was it the best decision that could have been made?
NCAC is urging a Maryland school district to allow its teachers to display a series of posters promoting diversity and inclusion in America after administrators ordered their removal over concerns of political bias.
The posters were deemed to break the school's policy that forbids classroom materials that attempt to sway the political opinions of students.
An exhibition of artworks celebrating Black History Month was removed from display in a San Jose School district building after complaints calling the works offensive.
The number of cases registered in 2016 more than doubled the amount registered in 2015, an increase of 119%, which translates to an extra 469 attacks.
American University Museum in Washington D.C. flubbed its approach to a controversial sculpture after it claimed it did not want the message of the sculpture to be deemed the institution's own.
Representative Clay has stood in support of artistic free expression in the face of criticisms that the painting contains an anti-police message.
David Wojnarowicz (born 1954, died 1992) Untitled (Buffalo), 1988-89. Vintage gelatin silver print, signed on verso, 28⅝x35¾; inches. Collection of Michael Sodomick, Courtesy of the Estate of David Wojnarowicz and P.P.O.W Gallery, New York In statements reminiscent of the culture wars of the 1990s, three Republican lawmakers in Cobb County, Georgia have attacked a museum exhibition that [...]
NCAC has sent a letter to Elgin Mayor David Kaptain supporting the mural's return in advance of the City Council's vote on its fate on July 13th.
Mark Ryden: Fountain, 2003. Oil on Panel, 12x6.25 inches. ©Mark Ryden. In a replay of former New York Mayor Guiliani's attempt to grab attention by attacking "blasphemous" art, Ben Loyola, a member of the Virginia Beach Arts and Humanities Commission, is directing his ire against the work of LA-based painter Mark Ryden, featured in Turn the Page: The First Ten Years of [...]
After cries of censorship, an eviction and a lawsuit, The Central Utah Art Center (CUAC) will receive a $60,000 in a settlement with the city of Ephraim, it was announced Friday. The lawsuit was filed in early 2013 after the CUAC was evicted from the space they had inhabited for 20 years. The city alleged the CUAC hadn't fulfilled its [...]
G. Wayne Clough is familiar to followers of NCAC as the Smithsonian Institution Secretary who unilaterally pulled a video from a National Portrait Gallery exhibition at the behest of Congressional Tea Party pressure. Clough has just announced he will resign … Continue reading →
"Art is a way to speak our minds!!!" one hand-drawn sign reads. "IB Art Matters!" reads another. These signs hang on the art display boards where art, done by Palmer High School's IB Art students, once hung. In response to recent censorship by the High School, students have made their voice heard in defense of their work and in support [...]
The recent rather heavy-handed treatment of Marc Bradley Johnson’s MFA thesis project at New York’s School of Visual Art (SVA) raises some interesting concerns—especially for an institution that aims to play a leadership role in the bio-art movement. Johnson’s project consists of a refrigerator containing 68 vials of his sperm arranged on a grid. The artist originally intended to give [...]
