{"id":477,"date":"2007-06-16T03:00:58","date_gmt":"2007-06-16T10:00:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=477"},"modified":"2007-06-16T10:34:57","modified_gmt":"2007-06-16T17:34:57","slug":"strange-culture-the-criminalization-of-art","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=477","title":{"rendered":"Strange Culture: The Criminalization Of Art"},"content":{"rendered":"

On May 11, 2004, Hope Kurtz died in her sleep of heart failure. The next morning, her husband Steve, an artist and a professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo, woke up and summoned the police. What followed is the subject of the film “Strange Culture<\/a>” which was featured yesterday at the Human Rights Watch International Film Festival.<\/p>\n

When the police arrived at the Kurtz’ home they found a collection of petri dishes and biological specimens. Steve explained that it was part of an art project he was preparing for exhibition at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art. While all of this could have been easily verified, the police, and the FBI agents they called in, decided that Steve was a bio-terrorist and arrested him as he was still trying to cope with having just lost his wife of twenty years.<\/p>\n

Steve’s artwork as a member of the Critical Art Ensemble<\/a> was often controversial and dealt with subject matters that were likely to rile authorities and wealthy and influential corporations. And although the government realized that there was nothing threatening in the articles confiscated from his home, they are still continuing to prosecute him on charges related to his acquisition of the specimens used in the art project. There is more background on this case at the Critical Art Ensemble Defense Fund<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n
\n
<\/a>Join The Art Insurgency!<\/a><\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

This is another particularly sad and disturbing example of how the rights of artists, and all Americans, are being suppressed in the name of security. It is a stark reminder that we must never allow these merchants of fear to silence us, and that we must continue to fight for the freedom to express ourselves and to challenge those in power who would prevent us from doing so.
\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On May 11, 2004, Hope Kurtz died in her sleep of heart failure. The next morning, her husband Steve, an artist and a professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo, woke up and summoned the police. What followed is the subject of the film “Strange Culture” which was featured yesterday at the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[9,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-477","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art-culture","category-general"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4Ijg-7H","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2101,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=2101","url_meta":{"origin":477,"position":0},"title":"More Proof That Fox News Is Not News","author":"Mark NC","date":"7\/12\/2010","format":false,"excerpt":"As if any further evidence was needed..... Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post wrote a profile of Fox News anchor Bill Hemmer. The piece began by making a completely unsupported assertion that Hemmer was \"a middle-of-the-road guy.\" However, Kurtz quickly redeemed himself by pointing out that Hemmer's record of fairness\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":41884,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=41884","url_meta":{"origin":477,"position":1},"title":"WHUT? Fox News Media Hack Says it’s ‘Unfair’ if Networks Don’t Cover All of Trump’s Cult Rallies.","author":"Mark NC","date":"6\/19\/2019","format":false,"excerpt":"It is well known that Fox News has foraged an uncommonly close relationship between themselves and Donald Trump. In fact, Trump would not be president today but for Fox News. They shamelessly championed his campaign, while simultaneously maligning Hillary Clinton and slandering his critics. Subsequently, they have continued to serve\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"Fox News, Donald Trump","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/foxnews-state-tv-trump-rally.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/foxnews-state-tv-trump-rally.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/foxnews-state-tv-trump-rally.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":11199,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=11199","url_meta":{"origin":477,"position":2},"title":"Does Fox News Have A Culture That Encourages Personal Attacks?","author":"Mark NC","date":"1\/6\/2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Much of the cable News circus was preoccupied this weekend with remarks made by MSNBC's Melissa Harris-Perry about Mitt Romney's family. It was a relatively trivial incident that sought to highlight the blinding whiteness of the Romney clan and, by extension, the Republican Party for which he was was briefly\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"Fox News","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/maddow-erickson.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5458,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=5458","url_meta":{"origin":477,"position":3},"title":"The Sorry Truth About Roger Ailes And Fox News","author":"Mark NC","date":"9\/29\/2011","format":false,"excerpt":"A few days ago Howard Kurtz of Newsweek published an article profiling Roger Ailes, the CEO of Fox News. It was revealing of both Kurtz and Ailes. The first sign that Kurtz was either unconscious or delusional was when he offered this description of Ailes' allegedly changing moods: \"[A]s President\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":20243,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=20243","url_meta":{"origin":477,"position":4},"title":"Racist Guest On Fox News Is Offended That He Might Be Viewed As Racist","author":"Mark NC","date":"8\/18\/2014","format":false,"excerpt":"This weekend's episode of MediaBuzz on Fox News featured a segment about the press coverage of the shooting death of Michael Brown, an unarmed teenager, by a Ferguson, MO police officer. Host Howard Kurtz booked Joe Concha, a conservative from Mediaite, and Keli Goff, a liberal from The Root, to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Civil Rights"","block_context":{"text":"Civil Rights","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=448"},"img":{"alt_text":"Fox News","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/foxnews-concha-goff.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/foxnews-concha-goff.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/foxnews-concha-goff.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1006,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=1006","url_meta":{"origin":477,"position":5},"title":"The Waterboard Thrill Ride","author":"Mark NC","date":"8\/6\/2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Late last month artist Steve Powers installed a new amusement at New York's Coney Island - the Waterboard Thrill Ride: Photo: Tom Giebel (atomische.com) This will exhibit, which features a scene of an animatronic torturer and victim, will continue through the summer. Feeding a dollar through the slot in the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Art\/Culture"","block_context":{"text":"Art\/Culture","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=9"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/477","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=477"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/477\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=477"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}