'Animal sex' sculpture too racy for Louvre finds home at Pompidou centre
After the Louvre museum said 'non' to the 'Domestikator' sculpture judging it to be too risqué, the nearby Pompidou centre agrees to host the artwork which appears to show a human having sexual intercourse with a four legged creature.
The Local reported earlier this month how the famous Louvre museum in Paris decided to axe plans to display a "sexually explicit" sculpture in the Tuileries Gardens, just weeks before it was set to be revealed.
The sculpture, entitled Domestikator and put together by the Dutch artist Joep Van Lieshout, shows what appears to be a box-shaped human in a sexual act with a box-shaped animal or just perhaps another person.
The director of the iconic Louvre museum, Jean-Luc Martinez, sent a letter to the organisers of the FIAC contemporary art fair, saying the work “had a brutal aspect”.
“It risks being misunderstood by the visitors to the gardens,” he added, reported Le Monde newspaper.
His decision angered the organisers of FIAC but now the nearby Pompidou has stepped in to make sure Parisians can make their own minds up about "Domestikator".
A defiant Bernard Blistene, director of the Pompidou Centre Museum told Reuters: “Obscene, pornographic? Well, obscenity is everywhere, pornography, sadly, is everywhere, certainly not in this work of art.
“This work of art is funny, it is an obvious nod to the relationship of abstraction and figurative painting that co-exist in Dutch art in the 20th century. Spiritual yes, obscene no.”
Too racy for Louvre, sex sculpture finds home at Pompidou Centre https://t.co/oLa9arVxZ1
— Mathieu Rosemain (@MathieuRosemain) October 18, 2017
The artist himself insists the 12-metre-high sculpture is not sexually explicit and says his work is to highlight the domestication of animals by humans for agriculture and industry.
France has played host to a series of clashes between art and sex in recent years, which we have pulled together in a gallery of images. Click on the link below.
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The Local reported earlier this month how the famous Louvre museum in Paris decided to axe plans to display a "sexually explicit" sculpture in the Tuileries Gardens, just weeks before it was set to be revealed.
The sculpture, entitled Domestikator and put together by the Dutch artist Joep Van Lieshout, shows what appears to be a box-shaped human in a sexual act with a box-shaped animal or just perhaps another person.
The director of the iconic Louvre museum, Jean-Luc Martinez, sent a letter to the organisers of the FIAC contemporary art fair, saying the work “had a brutal aspect”.
“It risks being misunderstood by the visitors to the gardens,” he added, reported Le Monde newspaper.
His decision angered the organisers of FIAC but now the nearby Pompidou has stepped in to make sure Parisians can make their own minds up about "Domestikator".
A defiant Bernard Blistene, director of the Pompidou Centre Museum told Reuters: “Obscene, pornographic? Well, obscenity is everywhere, pornography, sadly, is everywhere, certainly not in this work of art.
“This work of art is funny, it is an obvious nod to the relationship of abstraction and figurative painting that co-exist in Dutch art in the 20th century. Spiritual yes, obscene no.”
Too racy for Louvre, sex sculpture finds home at Pompidou Centre https://t.co/oLa9arVxZ1
— Mathieu Rosemain (@MathieuRosemain) October 18, 2017
The artist himself insists the 12-metre-high sculpture is not sexually explicit and says his work is to highlight the domestication of animals by humans for agriculture and industry.
France has played host to a series of clashes between art and sex in recent years, which we have pulled together in a gallery of images. Click on the link below.
READ ALSO:
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