About limits on artistic freedom

1. Artistic
freedom –
Should there
be Limits?
BY:
SUKRITI SINGH – BTBM/13/242
A0523113081
Amity Institute of Biotechnology
Amity University, NOIDA

2. What is Artistic Freedom
– Artistic freedom is the extent of freedom of an artist to produce art to his/her
own insight. The extent can deviate to customs in a certain school of art,
directives of the assigner, etc..
– Artistic freedom should not be confused to the freedom of art, where it is a
constitutional provision to prevent political censorship. Software patents are
often seen as an example of one of these restrictions.

3. Artistic freedom of Expression
– A powerful yet a vulnerable right.
– The right to shock.
– With right comes responsibilities.
– Inequality of access to this right

4. What are the limits to freedom of
artistic expression?
– Legal limits
– Public Censorship
– Police intervention
– Censorship and fear of causing offence
– Self-censorship

5. Institutional self-censorship
Making difficult choices about what work to produce is an essential part of the role of any programmer, commissioner
or artistic director, and they have to take funders, sponsors, artists, audiences into account when making decisions. But
self-censorship can be distinguished from other forms of editing, when the decision to drop a particular piece of work,
or cut certain phrases, characters or aspects of a work is dictated by either fear of the consequences or triggered by
prejudice. A key focus is to look at how selfcensorship operates in arts organisations and institutions of all sizes, public
authorities and other stakeholders. Strategies for tackling the causes of institutional self censorship are discussed in
the next section.
– Fear of consequences
– Risk aversion
– Financial pressures
– Cultural diversity policies and prejudice
– Local authorities
– Cultural diplomacy

6. Reinforcing support for artistic
freedom of expression
One of the main purposes is to begin to identify strategies to promote and defend
artistic freedom of expression across the sector, from commissioning the artist and
the first contact with funders and sponsors, throughout the lifecycle of the
artwork.
There was broad agreement that supporting artistic freedom of expression is
central to the role of arts venues, organizations and institutions in all art forms,
which provide a potentially safe space for saying challenging and difficult things.
Facilitating the dialogue between those that make art and those that view it is
‘part of the service to the public’. And yet there was a high degree of consensus
that arts organizations were not delivering effectively on this ‘service’.

7. – Opening up dialogue within and across the sector
– Public debate about the role of art in society
– Reclaiming controversy, Managing controversy and the need for
greater transparency
– More guidance on laws and rights
– Debate about a freedom of expression policy for the arts
– Working with funders and sponsors

8. About the motion
– With rights comes responsibilities and duties.
– Various works are being censored or banned either because
• It insults religious sentiments
• Or disrespects culture sensitivities
• Or has the information not meant for children below 18 to know.
 Has become controversial in secularist circles.
 To safeguard the so called culture, religious sentiments the artists are
• Banished
• Killed
• Beaten up

10. Rethinking the models of
functioning.

11. History of censorship dates back
– History is filled with examples of covert government censorship, from the 1873 Comstock Law
to the 1996 Communications Decency Act. Anthony Comstock, head of the Society for the
Suppression of Vice, boasted 194,000 "questionable pictures" and 134,000 pounds of books of
"improper character" were destroyed under the Comstock Law -- in the first year alone.
– The Communications Decency Act imposed an unconstitutional censorship scheme on the
Internet, accurately described by a federal judge as "the most participatory form of mass
speech yet developed.“
– In the late 1980s, state prosecutors brought a criminal obscenity charge against the owner of a
record store for selling an album by the rap group, 2 Live Crew. Although this was the first time
that obscenity charges had ever been brought against song lyrics, the 2 Live Crew case focused
the nation's attention on an old question: should the government ever have the authority to
dictate to its citizens what they may or may not listen to, read, or watch?

12. – To explain the above question let me frame few more questions.
o What a parent is expected to do to set a good foundation for his/her child’s moral values?
o What should they do to inculcate good habits?
o What should they do educate their child not only with bookish knowledge but also with values?
 To answer the above three questions everybody would agree with me would be that, ‘It is the
responsibility of a parents to teach his children about what is good and what is not, what is useful
for him at what age until their child is capable of deciding it for oneself. It is evident from the eg of a
potter that he has to mould the clay when it is wet because it cannot be mould once it sets, similarly
a parent has to educated his child with values in the growing and learning age of the child.’
 So in a way we would agree with the statement that ‘the government should have the authority to
dictate to its citizens what they may or may not listen to, read, or watch?’
 But this again should be for a certain age group and Right to Information should be still vested with
the citizens.

14. – There should be freedom on the imagination of artists but limitation on the execution. Artists
should not make art out of bothering people, hurting their sentiments, stirring up nuisance. The
freedom of expression is only valid when you are not hurting anybody feelings.
– Freedom of artists creating Religion controversies like Danish Cartoon Controversy, Author
Salman Rushdie’s controversy after the publication of his novel, The Satanic Verses and Painter
MF Hussain controversy, all are damaging the human emotions, culture and putting bad
examples of artistic freedom. It is insanity, not art to paint toilet seats with pictures of deity,
whiskey bottles in the hands of Goddess Durga, nude pictures of deities, deities on shoes, etc.
Such acts should be looked upon as a cognizable offence punishable by law. Such artists are
only seeking cheap publicity and morally corrupted.
– ”Self censorship” should be on artists. Self censorship is a control of what you say or do in
order to avoid annoying or offending others, a sudden increase in the number of legal cases
being filed against artists, actors and writers for “offending” people has caused great concern in
India’s art community.

15. Challenges to artistic freedom
-UNESCO
• Violations of international
human rights conventions
• Repression by non-state actors
• Nationalism and religious
orthodoxy
• Lack of solidarity
• Insufficient monitoring

16. – The artistic expression should not have limitations - in an ideal world.
However, if someone is offensive (like art that borders on pornography,
making fun of some one, mentally harassing someone, hurting one’s
sentiments and believes), then there have to be limitations. However, this
is a pretty controversial topic.

17. ‘Edgy’ or offensive?
– Many are familiar with works being censored (and defended) because they
challenge or insult religious groups and cultural sensitivities. But artistic
expression is controversial in secularist circles too.
– Comedians have recently come under fire for making jokes about the elderly,
the disabled and other minority groups. Many commentators have expressed
discomfort that what passes as ‘edgy’ and challenging today would’ve been
rightly criticised for its bigotry in the past.
– John O’Farrell worries that jokes about domestic violence normalise and even
encourage the act in reality. But others counter that while there is a precious
right to free speech, there is no such thing as a right not be offended.

18. Better judgement or self-
censorship?
– Even from those who feel art has become too shocking, there is a reluctance to see artistic value
defined by the police or state bodies. Instead, they argue that artists should exercise better moral
judgement in who and why they offend. But, says Kenan Malik, the Rushdie affair showed that self-
censorship is even more pernicious than its imposed form, as it means the public are not even
granted the chance to discuss or debate challenging ideas and opinions, and is a victory for those
who hate free speech.
– Censored novelist Sherry Jones says she is a victim of a disturbing new trend of pre-emptive
censorship, where work is banned or not published before it’s even had a chance to cause offence.
Stanley Fish, however, says moral criticism is not the same as censorship and that making aesthetic
judgement over what to include or exclude is integral to creating (and understanding) great art.
– Other critics point out that controversies over art and child pornography usually, and often
deservedly, generate more public censure than state censorship
– The traditional Western goal of disinterested aesthetic judgement is being replaced by personalised
and emotive responses: which inevitably leads to moral outrage when feelings are hurt and
sensibilities offended.

19. For art’s sake?
– Much of the current debate expresses an ambiguity around art’s function in contemporary society.
Many defend artistic freedom because artworks contextualise and allow us to reflect on ideas and
actions which would be shocking or illegal in real life.
– Philosopher Henri Bergson referred to comedy’s humanising virtue in allowing a ‘momentary
anaesthesia of the heart’ which allows us to suspend normal moral judgements. But if art can only
be defended in moral terms, is there a place for work which reflects or depicts immoral acts?
– When a work features indecent images of a child taken without their consent(UK case), or could
result in others being physically harmed, should there be some artistic responsibility? Does art have
a specific moral purpose, or can it be defended for its own aesthetic sake: where our response is
simply whether it is good or bad?

20. Restrictions to Art!
– Nadia Plesner's drawing Simple
Living(2007) was inspired by the artist's
reaction to mass media prioritizing
between world matters and celebrity
gossip.
– But it was sued by Louis Vuitton, Nadia
Plesner fought to include references to
status symbols in her art works, and was
declared by a court in the Hague
(international court) to be free to exhibit
the drawing. With the courtesy of the
artist.

23. Law taken in hands by the
citizens

24. – 2009 marked the twentieth anniversary of the fatwa against author Salman Rushdie after the publication of his
novel The Satanic Verses.
– Mark Lawson argues that the Noughties were a schizophrenic decade. On the one hand violent and sexually
explicit films such as Antichrist and 9 Songs pushed the barriers of taste further than ever before; on the other, he
argues, moral panics such as those around paedophilia led to censorship of works by respected artists such as Nan
Goldin and Richard Prince.
– The removal of Prince’s sexually suggestive image of a ten year old Brooke Shields from a Tate Modern exhibition
ignited the controversy around the limits of artistic expression, just as did debates around the novel Jewel of
Medina in 2008 or the Danish cartoons in 2005.
– These discussions are not just confined to traditionally ‘high arts’ or politically incendiary material though.
Comedians and dramatists have complained about a growing culture of offence and censorship which has been
seemingly reinforced by new BBC guidelines regulating offensive material. But some critics argue that many artists
now revel in being offensive for the sake of it, which not only reinforces unpleasant attitudes towards vulnerable
groups, but leads to bad art
– This argument suggests that artists shouldn’t be censored, but should exercise better judgement: but some point
out that there is a very fine line between better judgement and self-censorship.

25. The impact of cultural policies
The orientations of governmental art policies was the one factor that most artists saw as connected to
their freedom of expression. It is the supportive and positive role that was emphasized, and most
responding artists saw few dangers with an active and supportive state in art politics. Almost no one
thought that receiving public funding weakened their artistic freedom of expression, or that public
funding regimes implied dangers for the arms length principle. 83 per cent of responding authors saw no
problems with the active role of Norwegian artists organisations in the distribution of public grants to
artists. In general the survey confirmed that four cultural policy factors are important:
1) that the media and the internet is not censored
2) that public support is not connected to censorship or restrictions for use
3) that the main news media uphold their professional critique of art and literature
4) that artists organisations remain strong in cultural policy involvement.

26. The Status of Art
The results from the survey on artistic freedom of expression can be read as an indicator
of how the status of art in society is felt and interpreted. Most artists found that art has a
weakened position in society.
In general we must conclude that the conditions for artistic freedom of expression are
generally not under threat and plurality in the artistic public sphere is not restricted. The
impression from the survey is that it is the public sphere and the cultural conditions for
expression, and not the conditions for autonomous art production and artistic
expressions, that are under pressure. It is the consequences of having expressed
something that others perceive as controversial, the tendencies to “political correctness”
and the increasing number of incidents in which special interest groups claim particular
rights for protection and respect, that artists experience as problematic.

27. Key pressures on decision
making can be
– Self-censorship: Some artistic work is being suppressed at the ideas stage out of fear
that it will provoke controversy or cause offence
– Public and special interest group campaigns: The internet, social media and digital
technology have made it easier for public ‘outrage’ to gain momentum – many of
those calling for a ban will not even have seen or read the ‘offensive’ work
– Over-cautious policing: Fears of potential public order or safety issues are leading
the police to be overly cautious
– Financial pressures: In the current economic climate, institutions feel they ‘can’t
afford to court controversy’
– Cultural diversity policies: Rather than encouraging diversity of speech, these
policies have in some cases inadvertently suppressed work that might offend

28. One should
know when a
joke is a joke
and not an
offence!