The raruraru about the things you see - 5

Y'know, this is almost getting to the point of total stupidity.

This series of instances all come out of Sydney, thanks Sydney Morning Herald for the entertainment. And yes, from Sydney, the promised land of moral probity and righteousness; the land that brought (and expelled from society) Norman Lindsay for images such as these -




Firstly, and kinda related to the billboard that was erected (gotta watch my language here :) ) in Auckland comes this Blog stream. No, I didn't read any more than the first couple paras, and the opening .gif was more than enough.

Then over the past couple of days comes a parallel to the Cyrus argument. Again, I have not personally seen these images but the news item (including interviews and vox pop from both sides of the argument) gave a fair idea of the content. Seems that the difference between these and the Cyrus cover(less) image is a matter of being far more explicit and much less "demure". That is all on that.

But the hoo-ha is so great that even the PM gets in on the act -

Photographs of naked 12- and 13-year-olds at a Sydney exhibition shut down by police are revolting and have no artistic merit, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says.
...
The show includes large photographic prints of topless children, one of which was included on the opening night invitation.

Mr Rudd today weighed into the debate about the merits of the artworks, saying he thought they were "revolting".

"I find them absolutely revolting," he told the Nine Network.

I am not going to be judgmental here about the images. The SMH poll is interesting though -

Reader Poll

Bill Henson exhibition and images of naked children
Where do you stand?

It is art and acceptable - 35%

It is art but inappropriate - 24%

It is more offensive than artistic - 12%

It should be illegal - 29%


Total Votes: 5608

And yep, one of those votes is mine. I had to think, and voted accordingly in order to get access to the results. SMH is careful to point out that their surveys are not to be considered scientific and represent the views of only those who wanted to respond. That qualification is apt and required.

But I can't help wondering (and perhaps the SMH did too) if there was a connection between Rudd's comments and this little contre-temp.

As political commentary,


that is an excellent piece of art.

Melbourne City Council has defended its decision to reject a controversial painting by the nephew of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.

The painting depicts a Ronald McDonald holding a flaming Olympic torch, while a monk burns in the background.

Van Thanh Rudd's work, which he this afternoon revealed was intended as a homage to British street artist Banksy, shows Ronald McDonald carrying the Olympic torch past a burning monk.

UPDATE - SUNDAY

Clearing my (non-existent) mail this morning and turned this out from the Yahoo home page

Is it acceptable for nude photos of underage girls to be shown as art?
Thanks for voting 35455 votes since May 22 2008
Yes 18% 6494 votes
No 82% 28961 votes

Interesting contrast, and the same caveats as the SMH poll.