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Arts & Culture Advocacy Program

UN Special Rapporteur: Freedom of expression & Copyright

By |2020-01-03T15:06:07-05:00April 10th, 2015|Blog|

At the 28th Session of the Human Rights Council in March 2015, Ms. Farida Shaheed, the UN Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights, presented her report on copyright laws and policies and their effect on artistic freedom. The report emphasizes the need to balance intellectual property rights with the need to empower creativity. It supports copyright exceptions and limitations that enable caricature, parody, pastiche and appropriation art, which all borrow recognizably from prior works in order [...]

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Censored Art: Profanity and Police Brutality

By |2020-01-03T15:01:07-05:00February 6th, 2015|Blog|

The Charlie Hebdo massacres prompted worldwide calls to embrace and celebrate artistic freedom. But actions speak louder than words. As demonstrations in support of free speech were held in Paris and we all reconfirmed our commitment to an open exchange of ideas, two cultural spaces in the United States-– one a library, the other a university-– censored artwork.

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NCAC Joins Worldwide Secret Cinema Screenings to Protest Censorship of The Interview

By |2020-01-05T23:18:47-05:00December 22nd, 2014|Blog|

On Sunday, Dec 21st, NCAC joined Secret Cinema and Spectrum to screen Charlie Chaplin's The Great Dictator in protest against the cancellation of The Interview. As NCAC noted in a statement regarding the cancellation, threats of violence have become increasingly successful in suppressing cultural expression. Before Sony Pictures Entertainment withdrew its film, The Interview, from all outlets of circulation and distribution, we saw London’s [...]

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NCAC Joins FIRE in Letter to University of Iowa Over Disturbing Censorship

By |2020-01-02T15:33:06-05:00December 16th, 2014|Incidents|

The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) and the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) are urging University of Iowa president Sally Mason to issue a statement recognizing the First Amendment rights of Professor Serhat Tanyolacar and make clear that his artwork is fully protected under the First Amendment. The letter was issued in response to the forced removal from [...]

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The Damned Dozens: Art Censorship in 2014

By |2020-01-06T00:07:35-05:00December 4th, 2014|Blog|

Don’t hold your breath for nipple reveals or cock shows – while artistic representations of nudes remain a regular target of censorship, the most compelling and controversial artwork in 2014 came from artists challenging social norms and exposing cultural fissures. There was the occasional use of female anatomy or children as subjects, but what each painting, photo, or mural on [...]

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Bravos Drown Out Hecklers at “Death of Klinghoffer” Opening

By |2020-01-03T14:47:51-05:00October 22nd, 2014|Incidents|

The audience coming to see John Adams' Death of Klinghoffer on Monday, October 20th, had to pass through a cordon of angry protesters crying "shame" and holding placards condemning the Metropolitan Opera of rather far fetched things like "taking terrorist $$$" or "glorifying terrorism." They must not have succeeded in shaming anyone as the house was full. The few hecklers in the [...]

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International Free Speech Organizations Condemn Barbican Exhibit B Cancellation

By |2020-01-03T14:52:15-05:00September 26th, 2014|Incidents|

The National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) has joined the UK based Index of Censorship and other members of ARTSFEX, an international civil society network actively concerned with the right of artists to freedom of expression, in a statement condemning an alarming worldwide trend in which violent protest silences artistic expression that some groups claim is offensive. The below statement was issued [...]

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U.S. Fails to Protect the Right to Access Culture, Says Report

By |2016-01-27T15:06:41-05:00September 25th, 2014|Press Releases|

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE In a submission to a UN human rights review, anti-censorship groups document violations of freedom of information and expression in public schools, jails, and prisons New York and Copenhagen For more information contact Svetlana Mintcheva at 212-807-6222 In a new report to the United Nations assessing the United States’ compliance with its human rights obligations, two leading [...]

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Sculpture of Male Nude Declared Porn by Some Texans

By |2020-01-03T14:52:14-05:00September 24th, 2014|Blog|

Jorge Marin's sculpture group Wings of the City has been on display in Houston's Discovery Green Park since early September. Almost predictably some viewers are objecting to the nudity of the sculptures. As usual those who object do it supposedly on behalf of the innocence of children - though Wings of the City has been exhibited internationally with no apparent damage to [...]

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Conflict Avoidance

By |2020-01-03T14:47:46-05:00June 12th, 2014|Blog|

Cancelled commencement speakers, a rush of attempts to put trigger warnings on class content, student petitions to remove potentially disturbing artwork from campus… What is going on? Academia is no stranger to free speech battles. In the 1950s professors could be ousted for “treasonous or seditious acts or utterances” or for being members of an organization advocating the violent overthrow [...]

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Damien Hirst’s “The Virgin Mother” Under Fire In Long Island. Protect Interesting Public Art!

By |2020-01-03T14:47:27-05:00May 8th, 2014|Blog|

Damien Hirst's The Virgin Mother is a large piece about even larger subjects: life, death, birth, and humanity. But is it too large for Old Westbury, L.I.? The Virgin Mother was previously displayed (there are several casts) at Lever House in Manhattan, outside London's Royal Academy, and on Fontvieille Harbour, Monaco. But now that it landed in posh Old Westbury, [...]

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Read an excerpt from Svetlana Mintcheva’s essay in the new “Handbook on Intellectual Freedom”

By |2020-01-03T14:43:55-05:00April 14th, 2014|Blog|

We're excited about the just-released Library Juice Press Handbook of Intellectual Freedom because, in addition to being a landmark resource on the state of free inquiry and expression, it features a new essay by NCAC's Svetlana Mintcheva on censorship, past and present, in the arts. Library Juice talks about the need for this handbook on their blog: The existing reference literature on intellectual [...]

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Kennesaw State reinstates art installation, but is there more trouble brewing in Academia? Trigger warnings.

By |2020-01-03T14:38:05-05:00March 14th, 2014|Blog|

Kennesaw State finally formally announced the reinstatement of Ruth Stanford's “A Walk in the Valley” to the opening exhibition at the new Bernard A. Zuckerman Museum of Art. The piece, a commissioned work about Georgia author Corra Harris' homestead, was taken down two weeks ago, shortly before the formal opening on Saturday, March 1st.

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Kennesaw State University To Restore Censored Artwork

By |2019-03-15T16:36:39-04:00March 4th, 2014|Incidents|

The National Coalition Against Censorship received word that Ruth Stanford's "A Walk in the Valley" has been restored to the Kennesaw State University's Zuckerman Museum of Art. KSU had said “A Walk in the Valley” was pulled because it did not fit the "celebratory nature" of the museum's opening.

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Why is this artist’s work “too controversial” for an art center exhibition?

By |2019-03-15T17:47:16-04:00January 9th, 2014|Blog|

Paul Carter/The Register-Guard As a dues-paying member of the Emerald Art Center in Springfield, OR, Linda Cunningham prepared a piece of work for the monthly members' show. The "pastoral" works of other members were accepted without incident, but Cunningham's three-dimensional piece was deemed "too controversial" and rejected by the executive board of the Art Center, according to The [...]

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Happy Nude Year! Lawsuit Forces Display of Nudes Until January 17

By |2019-03-07T12:08:03-05:00December 13th, 2013|Blog|

Court settlement extends San Bernardino County Government Center exhibit, to compensate for time during which paintings had been removed. Today NCAC and and the ACLU of Southern California were please to see the final court settlement that extends the exhibition time of three recently restored paintings at the San Bernardino County Government Center. The extended display period will compensate for [...]

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*UPDATE: VICTORY!* ACLU files lawsuit to uphold artistic freedom in San Bernardino County

By |2020-01-03T14:08:10-05:00November 22nd, 2013|Incidents|

  **Victory! San Bernardino County Restores Artwork! NCAC congratulates artists, community members, and ACLU for defending First Amendment principles** Read the whole story in the San Bernardino Sun.   This past September, NCAC received a call from an artist outraged at the removal of three paintings from the Hispanic National Heritage Art Exhibition at the San Bernardino County Government Center. Apparently [...]

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Street Artist Essam Talks About His Arrest, Importance of Artistic Freedom

By |2020-01-05T23:15:53-05:00August 15th, 2013|Blog|

Essam Political street artist Essam Attia, 30, was arrested last November for planting dozens of fake public service ads around Manhattan claiming that the New York Police Department (NYPD) used drones to spy on citizens. The pubic was quick to react, launching an online Free Essam campaign and a petition asking that all charges be dropped. We caught [...]

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Photographer Betsy Schneider on the Kohler Arts Center Banning Her Work

By |2020-01-03T14:07:29-05:00August 12th, 2013|Blog|

Betsy Schneider Are photos of a naked child offensive? Some folks in Sheboygan, WI, thought Betsy Schneider’s images of her growing daughter were offensive and recently pressured the Michael Kohler Arts Center to remove them from a group show. NCAC spoke to Schneider, an award-winning photographer, about her reaction to the ban, her now-teenage daughter’s response to all [...]

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Chris Brown’s Monstery House, Graffiti as Art and Other First Amendment Questions

By |2020-01-03T14:07:13-05:00July 1st, 2013|Blog|

Last week brought us one of those rare occasions where Perez Hilton reported on the invocation of First Amendment rights, as Chris Brown declared he would fight a Los Angeles citation. Brown was fined $376 for "unpermitted and excessive signage" for graffiti he had painted on the outside of his Hollywood Hills home, after neighbors complained that the pictures terrified [...]

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Report to UN High Commission: Artistic Freedom Must Be Protected or Democracy Suffers

By |2020-01-03T14:17:28-05:00May 31st, 2013|Incidents|

GENEVA,  May 31, 2013–Today the Special Rapporteur on cultural rights, Farida Shaheed, delivered a landmark report on artistic freedom  and expression to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland. Shaheed is the first Independent Expert on cultural rights appointed by the U.N. The U.S-based National Coalition Against Censorship lauded the report as an important milestone for international mobilizing in support of  free artistic expression as a human right.

 

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NY Art School Boxes Student Sperm Project

By |2020-01-03T13:50:17-05:00March 5th, 2013|Blog|

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 [...]

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On the First Day of Censorship, the Censors Gave to Me…

By |2020-01-03T13:49:43-05:00December 3rd, 2012|Blog|

The Twelve Days of Censorship No art in Newark library This post is part of our Twelve Days of Censorship series, reporting the gifts of the Ghosts of Censors Past and Present in honor of the holiday season.  On the First Day of Censorship, the Censors Gave to Me... no art in Newark Public Library. The Newark Public Library is [...]

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