Break the Silence
Maine artists held a demonstration outside the Farnsworth Museum on February
5 to voice objection to the exhibit, "Fire and Ice," featuring paintings by
war combat artist Sergeant Michael Fay. According to the demonstrators, the
paintings document military life in combat zones without placing those
images in the context of the true costs of war. The artists protested the
tradition of recording war without questioning its morality. They objected
to what they saw as the museum's implicit support of war. They felt that the
exhibit displays a lack of sensitivity and an apparent support of the
immoral war and occupation in Iraq. Because the soldiers depicted are
Americans, the presumption is that what they are doing is "right."
Natasha Mayers, one of the artist-organizers of the protest, noted that Sgt.
Fay had been a Marine recruiter for one of his tours of duty. "Having his
art in the museum is a lot like having military recruiters come into the
high schools in Maine," Mayers noted, "without allowing Veterans for Peace,
conscientious objectors, and/or draft counselors to also come in and talk
with the students." Robert Shetterley, President of the Union of Maine
Visual Artists, objected to the way the exhibit "betrays and uses the
soldiers to be the cover for the insidious policy behind them. It's part of
the long tradition of the powerful — expending the lives of the poor and
enlisting its own people to do the dirty work of economic exploitation in
the name of patriotism."
For people concerned that the protest undermined Sgt Fay's and the museum's
free speech, Mayers noted that the artist-protesters encouraged the public
to see the Farnsworth exhibit and later attend the exhibit planned for Elan
gallery in Rockland by Shetterley, herself, and others. "We encourage the
museum," Mayers continued, "to show art by Iraqis, or art by Mainers serving
in Iraq who are not paid to make "official" art, or antiwar art by Mainers,
or a propaganda show that would show all sides.
Speaking at the height of the Vietnam War, in 1967, Martin Luther King, Jr.
said, "A time comes when silence is betrayal." Maine artists today who
believe the time has come for a withdrawal from Afghanistan and Iraq, an end
to preemptive war and an end to torture, are planning a group show "When
Silence is Betrayal" to be held later this winter. Participating in the
exhibit will be artists Mayers, Shetterley, Frank Pitcher, and Patricia
Wheeler, among others. Some are members of the Union of Maine Visual
Artists. FMI: info@artactivism.org
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Talk Index, Spring 2005