The Artist As Josef Fritzl's Interior Decorator
IN the spirit of AGW economics, a critic introduces titillation offsets: "In some cultures, it seems unquestionably appropriate to behead a woman for wearing a miniskirt. And up to a point, we have to respect those alien standards..." So writes Robert Nelson in his defence of the creative right of an "artist" - one with a lot less talent than most sports photographers - to display pictures of nude, sexually posed children. It would be difficult to find a better distillation of the berserkness that characterises Western liberalism. An ideology that considers Islamic women being decapitated as the price to be paid for a more "tolerant" world is quite literally an illness. Nelson, however, believes this idea purchases for bourgeois fashion sheep the right to not feel bad about enjoying artistic child abuse. Little wonder the same people opposed John Howard's intervention to save Aboriginal children from sexual exploitation - not with dandies claiming Bill Henson's work is like "the iconography of the Annunciation" and the Titian of Tween himself "the undisputed Numero Uno" and victimised "lightning rod for our fears." Mr Howard didn't accept that Mutitjulu, like Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, is another country - or that they should do things differently there.
_____________________________________________________
Oh, but Henson “obtains the full co-operation of his subjects and their families, many of whom have remained friends.” Makes him sound like a cult leader.
_____________________________________________________
Were it not for the casuistic zealotry, the tsunami of apologetics that washed through the pages of the Fairfaxian press about this subject today could be dismissed as just an ostentatious display of look-at-me radicalism. Or maybe as the hitherto self-censored venting of a liberal commentariat now fatigued by the inner struggle of pretending Kevin Rudd is really Don Dunstan in-the-making. He isn't. But there's more to it than modish posing and re-projected loathing - something more serious. In the Sydney Morning Herald an hysterical John McDonald argued Henson's subjects "are no longer children, but not yet adults." If he'd added "your honour," that insight would be indistinguishable from an excuse heard in a thousand underage sex cases every year. Twelve and thirteen year-olds are children. Oh, but Henson "obtains the full co-operation of his subjects and their families, many of whom have remained friends." Makes him sound like a cult leader. It's also totally irrelevant, as the AMA reminded Queensland health officials in April when the latter cited parental consent for giving contraceptive implants to underage girls. Children are children. Which part of that do some artists - and various others - not understand?
Oh, but Henson “obtains the full co-operation of his subjects and their families, many of whom have remained friends.” Makes him sound like a cult leader.
_____________________________________________________
Were it not for the casuistic zealotry, the tsunami of apologetics that washed through the pages of the Fairfaxian press about this subject today could be dismissed as just an ostentatious display of look-at-me radicalism. Or maybe as the hitherto self-censored venting of a liberal commentariat now fatigued by the inner struggle of pretending Kevin Rudd is really Don Dunstan in-the-making. He isn't. But there's more to it than modish posing and re-projected loathing - something more serious. In the Sydney Morning Herald an hysterical John McDonald argued Henson's subjects "are no longer children, but not yet adults." If he'd added "your honour," that insight would be indistinguishable from an excuse heard in a thousand underage sex cases every year. Twelve and thirteen year-olds are children. Oh, but Henson "obtains the full co-operation of his subjects and their families, many of whom have remained friends." Makes him sound like a cult leader. It's also totally irrelevant, as the AMA reminded Queensland health officials in April when the latter cited parental consent for giving contraceptive implants to underage girls. Children are children. Which part of that do some artists - and various others - not understand?
<< Home