(Screenshot from washingtonpost.com)
Until now! What kind of "kink" do you think they're going to feature at the ceremony? And what does it all have to do with hurricane Irene? Maybe rescue worker fetish? This could be really interesting.
Friday, August 26, 2011
OK, Now I'm Interested
Until now! What kind of "kink" do you think they're going to feature at the ceremony? And what does it all have to do with hurricane Irene? Maybe rescue worker fetish? This could be really interesting.
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12 comments:
The artist makes King look like he's in his late 50's. If only he'd had the chance to live that long. Really, that sculpture is awful. I don't think it will ever come to be beloved like the Viet Nam Memorial was. That started with controversy as well.
I was listening to NPR yesterday when they were discussing the monument. A lot of the callers had issues that a darker stone wasn't used, and the architect writer for the Post argued (sensibly I thought) that white stone was more viewable from a distance, at night, and cast better shadows.
The other big issue was "Why wasn't an African-American sculptor used." The given answer seems to be there wasn't one who could take on the project.
My own issues are the style it was carved in. If you've ever seen Communist statues, in Russia or China, they all have that "striving workers united," or "the fallen at Stalingrad" feel to them, and there's more than a whiff of that in the MLK piece.
...and why isn't the "I have a dream" quote there? And what is that wad of paper in his hands?
watersports!
and no, i'm not advocating that be done to the monument. i actually like they way its done, very stoic and a portrail of conviction, which is how i imagine MLK Jr was in real life.
Although, he does kind of look like he's been frozen in carbonite by Hoover the Hut.
Ray Davies.
Contemporary business attire does not translate well in sculpture. This monument would be much better done if MLK were clad in classical dress. Also, the toga could serve well as the focal point for the kink.
I think the whole thing would have come across much, much better on a smaller scale (why is it SO BIG???) and in bronze.
Here at my college we have a bronze of Sam Rayburn in a suit, banging a gavel (he's our only famous alumna.) The same artist did the Audie Murphy down the road during his Army days. Guess which one looks better? And I agree that bronze is better than stone and should have been used for Dr. King. I also agree that Davies is, indeed, my favorite Kink.
On a more serious-ish note, all this talk of smaller and bronze reminded me of the statues handed out to different cities around the world by the Gandhi Memorial International Foundation. I've seen a few of them (in SF, NYC, and Honolulu), and have found them to be tasteful, reverent, and mostly well-placed (except that the one in SF is in a pretty crappy location). Too bad the organization that funded them turned out to be a scam organization, but that doesn't detract from the notability of the project as far as I'm concerned.
These statues (the ones I've seen at least) depict Gandhi stepping forward, which I think would have been a better choice than whatever MLK is doing in his monument (waiting to give a speech on a chilly day?). Either that or a mid-oration pose. Much better than this "I've been to the mountaintop, and some of it stuck to my back" deal.
"It should have been done in bronze." I agree.
We've got one of those Gandhis in DC, off Dupont Circle.
The most "Stalinist" element in the MLK statue is that it depicts Martin as someone who wants to indoctrinate (as if by hypnosis) rather than communicate. This is not the man who gave us the "I have a Dream" speech which I, for one, cannot listen to (as I have innumerable times) without deep emotion, if not, quite frankly, tears. This crude depiction of an inspiring leader with profound religious roots creates an enormous psychological distance between the viewer and what she/he's looking at. You feel you have to genuflect before the King altar (in my case, I would with great trepidation, given how awful it looks; I'd rather kneel before the Pieta, a real work of art).
Now, the fact that the sculptor is Chinese is quite irrelevant (I suspect one of the reasons he was chosen was that he was neither white or black, a politically "safe" choice). But what is pertinent is that the artist (he really doesn't deserve the honor of that name) clearly doesn't evoke in his work the subtlety and fragility of being human -- or the American historical context. MLK looks like a stern, ideologically-committed leader in the Chinese/Russian revolution, as depicted by state-supported art workers following the Party's dictates. There is little, in my view, that is "American" in this statue (e.g., our constant experimentation with who we are and could/should be, our lack of a firm identity which provides such hope for the future) -- or that evokes the tumultuous epoch which Dr. King did so much to shape positively (yes, positively; here I take a political stance) in a humane and non-violent way.
This tasteless horror in granite is an appalling, cheap (despite its price tag) propaganda piece of stone -- it should never be called a work of art -- to have on the Mall, which, as I understand it, is dedicated to the aspirations of American democracy. Rather than opening the past to the present, it encloses it in a lapidary, dare I say totalitarian silence. As I look at it, I think of (with considerable regret) Shelley's poem Ozymandias, a sad reminder that America, if left to those who wish to glorify, Stalinist-style, its leaders, rather than understand and remember them for who they (and we) are as imperfect human beings, may go the way of ancient Egypt.
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