=> Uncle Spammy's Gestapo buddies Assault Female Art Gallery Owner ...! <=
=> Vox Populi ©
Sunday, May 30, 2004
AP
SAN FRANCISCO — A San Francisco gallery owner bears a painful reminder of the
nation's unresolved anguish over the incidents at the Abu Ghraib (search)
prison: a black eye delivered by an unknown assailant who apparently objected to
a painting that depicts U.S. soldiers torturing Iraqi prisoners.
The assault outside the Capobianco gallery in the city's North Beach district
Thursday night was the worst in a string of verbal and physical attacks directed
at Lori Haigh (search) since the artwork was installed at her gallery on May 16.
San Francisco police are investigating and have stepped up patrols around the
gallery. But Haigh decided to close the gallery indefinitely, citing concern for
the safety of her two children, ages 14 and 4, who often accompanied her to
work.
Guy Colwell's painting, titled "Abuse," depicts three U.S. soldiers leering at a
group of naked men in hoods with wires connected to their bodies. The one in the
foreground has a blood-spattered American flag patch on his uniform. In the
background, a soldier in sunglasses guards a blindfolded woman.
The painting was part of a show of the Berkeley artist's work that mostly
featured pastel-colored abstracts.
Colwell stopped by the gallery Friday, but refused to discuss his work or the
reaction to it, saying only, "I'm sorry if this is putting pressure on Lori."
Two days after the painting went up in a front window, someone threw eggs and
dumped trash on the doorstep. Haigh said she did not think to connect it to the
events at Baghdad's notorious prison until people started leaving nasty messages
and threats on her business answering machine.
"I think you need to get your gallery out of this neighborhood before you get
hurt," one caller said.
She removed the painting from the window, but the gallery's troubles received
news coverage and the criticism continued. The answering machine recorded new
calls from people accusing her of being a coward for moving the artwork.
Last weekend, Haigh said a man walked into the gallery, pretended to scrutinize
the painting for a moment, then marched up to her desk and spat in her face.
On Thursday, someone knocked on the door of the gallery, then punched Haigh in
the face when she stepped outside.
"This isn't art-politics central here at all," Haigh said. "I'm not here to make
a stand. I never set out to be a crusader or a political activist."
In closing the gallery, Haigh was forced to cancel an upcoming show featuring
counterculture artist Winston Smith.
For Haigh, who opened Capobianco a year and a half ago, having the chance to
work with prominent artists fulfilled a lifelong dream.
"I kept thinking someday I'll have enough of a reputation where I could bring in
my heroes of the art world, people like Guy Colwell especially," she said.
Haigh has received some expressions of support since closing the gallery. Her
favorite: an e-mail whose writer said, "I'm sure that a few and dangerous minds
don't understand that they have only mimicked the same perversity this painting
had expressed."
--
"The most important thing is for us to find Osama bin Laden. It is our
number one priority and we will not rest until we find him."
~ George Bush Jr. 2001-09-13
"I don't know where he (bin Laden) is. I have no idea and I really don't care.
It's not that important. It's not our priority."
~ George Bush Jr. 2002-03-13
"I was not prepared to shoot my eardrum out with a shotgun in order to get a
deferment. Not was I willing to go to Canada. So I chose to better myself by
learning how to fly airplanes."
~George W. Bush on how he dodged the
Vietnam draft---1994