Art and Homosexuality Exhibition
First Cancelled in Milan, the Controversial Event Opened in Florence
Censorship could not stop the most extensive event on the subject ever staged in Italy, with works by 150 artists from early photography to the present day
On 27 October 2007, a hugely controversial exhibition about "Art and Homosexuality. From Von Gloeden to Pierre et Gilles" opened in the Palazzina Reale, a beautiful 1930s annex to the Santa Maria Novella train station in Florence, Italy.
Censorship in Milan and transfer to Florence
Supervised by Eugenio Viola (for the photography section) and Vittorio Sgarbi (for the paintings), the exhibition was originally meant for the Palazzo della Ragione in Milan, where it was called off just one day after launching in July 2007. The Milanese city council censored it in spite of Vittorio Sgarbi being the city's councillor for the Arts as well as one of Italy's most popular art critics.
The Florence opening was not without controversy too, with the local town council refusing to grant its patronage to the event. In the end, 'Art and homosexuality' could only happen on account of being one hundred percent privately funded, and held in a privately owned, privately rented space.
Homoerotic aesthetics: beyond homosexual artists
The curators stress that this is not a collection of works by homosexual artist, but rather a comprehensive anthology of works (by artists of any sexual orientation) dealing with homoerotic - or, if you like, gay, lesbian or transgender - themes, ranging from classic icons such as St. Sebastian to camp aesthetics.
The culprit: prudery or bigotry?
Italy may stand out for its sexual prudery, yet there is strong evidence that what caused such an uproarious scandal was a totally different kind of bigotry: by everyone's reckoning, the big issue in Milan was a statue by Paolo Schmidlin called 'Miss Kitty', portraying an elderly transvenstite whose features bear an uncunny resemblance to pope Benedict XII's.
Of course, Schmidlin's 'Miss Kitty' was only one of the many works censored in Milan, where the exhibition was labelled as offensive to "the sensibility and the values of our City and our Country." All things considered, this made freethinkers even more worried than if the issue had been homosexuality per se, because of the intellectual subjection to the Vatican it implies.
Incidentally, Paolo Schmidlin had already caused quite a stir with the British press in February 2007 at Arco (the Contemporary Art Fair of Madrid in Spain) when he exhibited a bust of a Queen Elizabeth II lookalike having sex.
'Miss Kitty' is on display in Florence, where it is screened behind a retractable courtain to allow visitors to "exert their free will" of seeing it or not – though, as curator Eugenio Viola rightly observed during the press launch of the exhibition, ironically this arrangement makes 'Miss Kitty' the object of a peep show, adding more than a touch of voyeurism to the experience.
Quantity versus quality
Detractors suggest that the exhibition was intended from the start to hit the headlines by causing some kind of sensation, yet there is little denying that indeed, this is the most extensive event of its kind ever staged in Italy, presenting 220 works by over 150 Italian and international artists spanning the period from the birth of photography through to the present day, including names such as Andy Warhol, Robert Mappelthorpe, Helmut Newton, Tamara de Lempicka, Aubrey Beardsley and Igor Mitoraj.
Perhaps the organizers may have even overdone it and quantity may have meant lower quality on average, but nevertheless the exhibitions does have the merit to explore its chosen subject matter thoroughly, and without falling into the trap of bad taste.
What next?
'Art and homosexuality' will be in Florence until 2nd January 2008, after which the show will be ready to transfer to a leading (but as yet unannounced) art gallery in London in March 2008.
