UK museum bans artwork to avoid offending Muslims
- From: "Faris Jawad" <ana_faris_bila_jawad@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 27 Sep 2005 07:02:12 -0400
UK museum bans artwork to avoid offending Muslims
9/26/2005 5:00:00 PM GMT
A British museum decided to remove a sculpture from an exhibition, saying
that the work may offend Muslims.
The Tate Britain announced that it will not include "God is Great" (1991) in
a display of works by British-based artist John Latham.
"God is Great" features copies of the Bible, Qur'an and Talmud, sacred texts
of Christians, Muslims, and Jews respectively, embedded in thick glass.
"Having sought wide-ranging advice, Tate feels that to exhibit the work in
London in the current sensitive climate, post-July 7, would not be
appropriate," a museum spokesman said.
"The artist was informed of the decision and regretted that we were unable
to show the work at the current time,"
"He asked that we include a label in the room to make it clear to visitors
why the work was not on display," the spokesman added.
The museum's decision angered Latham, who said that his work wasn't
"offensive to anybody" and that the decision to remove it from the show was
taken "behind my back and behind the curator's back".
"It shows that all religious teaching comes from the same source, whatever
name you give to it," he said.
The Muslim Council of Britain told the BBC: "We have not received any
complaints about this piece of artwork.
"We would have preferred to have been consulted by Tate Britain before the
decision was taken to remove John Latham's piece.
"Sometimes presumptions are incorrectly made about what is unacceptable to
Muslims and this can be counter-productive."
The museum will debate issues around the subject in a public forum on
November 8.
Source: BBC
http://islamonline.com/cgi-bin/news_service/world_full_story.asp?service_id=1777
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