Last week, the Plano Independent School District in Texas decided to pull a humanities textbook that is used by freshmen and sophomores in the district's gifted and talented program. The book in question, Culture and Values: A Survey of the Humanities: Alternative Volume, is a survey of various pieces of artwork throughout history. Apparently, a couple was concerned that their [...]
Over the holiday weekend, the town of Bemidji, Minnesota removed a piece of public artwork by Deborah Davis entitled Gaea. It is a statue of a beaver, one of ten in the city. The reason for its removal was over what was depicted on the beaver’s belly. The artist said it is supposed to be a depiction of two hands [...]
Representations of nudes in painting, sculpture, and photography frequently become subject to controversy. The law, however, is clear: simple nudity (that is nudity outside of a sexually explicit situation) has full constitutional protection. (That does not mean that public officials are always aware of this as a current case in Temecula, CA, testifies.) But what about a live [...]
Cooper Union takes down a banner of Stalin, a reproduction of a drawing by Picasso that was part of an exhibit designed by Norwegian artist Lene Berg. The explanation: In a statement issued to Cooper Union staff members and students, the university said it removed the banner after the Buildings Department, which had received complaints about it, pointed out the [...]