Comments on Animals in the Art Gallery

"Save the tarantulas!" "Save the scorpions!" "Save the cockroaches!"
Good God.

Sounds like crap- your rationalizations don't convince otherwise.

There probably isn't nearly as much outrage as there might be (what? no PETA-ians chaining themselves to the museum umbrella stand?) because it's full of creepy-crawlies, not cute fluffy things.
There was a big protest (well, at least a dozen people big, not WTO big) in Seattle in the 70s?80s? when Anne Hamilton, one of my art idols, filled a walk-in room at the Henry with canaries and one died. Here, I'm sure people are just glad that they're in a cage.

Oh, and I just love it when people say things like "It’s pretty clear that the intention is (blank)" or "It's obvious the artist meant (whatever thing we don't like)". The only obvious forms of art are plain portraits and porn. If it's off-the-wall (pun intended) enough to include live animals, it's probably not meant to be whatever pops into your head first.

Come on, guys. The animals didn't even have water in there. Is it just ok because they're not fluffy? If it was cages of dogs and cats laying there with no water occasionally killing each other, that'd be just fine?

I'm not down there protesting, but I was glad to hear that the SPCA got involved and had a vet come through.

“It gives people who go there and look at [Huang’s work] with an open mind the realization that, yes, they are predator and prey and they can cohabitate together—the lion sleeping with the lamb. Most animals don’t kill for the sheer pleasure of killing. It’s either defense or obtaining prey.”

Yes... and if you throw two fighting dogs into a pit and one kills the other in self-defense, the person who intentionally put the dog in there is guilty of animal cruelty. These are animals that don't normally co-exist and that have been put into displays that require them to be in close contact. They have no means of retreat.

That photo looks a lot like this Escher: http://tukey.upf.es/various/some-pictures/escher_lizards.gif

It's nauseating to do that to living creatures.

That photo looks a lot like this Escher: http://tukey.upf.es/various/some-pictures/escher_lizards.gif

Sounds more like a horribly designed diorama at a fourth rate natural history museum or drive through zoo than anything that should count as art. If you want to see real animal art, look up britches the monkey.

Cultural relativism doesn't require that we accept "unclaimed" human bodies exposed in our museums or exhibits with animals taken out of their native environments and left to fight each other or cower in a corner defensively.

One day in a big Chinese city in a boiling hot day I saw a group of people staring at a shallow box with 20 or so chicken chicks. Some chicks were clearly dead, with more to come because there was no water or shade. No one was doing anything. They just stared. Maybe it was art? What I do know is that it represented a different way of looking at animals than I have. In any case, I expect this here piece is not as "culturally daring" as you think.

You could probably make and "artistically meaningful" piece involving the torture and live bloodletting of a puppy, maybe intended to be about how socialism (or capitalism) sucks the life out of the innocent individual. To most people though, it would just look like gratuitous puppy torture.

Cultural relativism doesn't require that we accept "unclaimed" human bodies exposed in our museums or exhibits with animals taken out of their native environments and left to fight each other or cower in a corner defensively.

One day in a big Chinese city in a boiling hot day I saw a group of people staring at a shallow box with 20 or so chicken chicks. Some chicks were clearly dead, with more to come because there was no water or shade. No one was doing anything. They just stared. Maybe it was art? What I do know is that it represented a different way of looking at animals than I have. In any case, I expect this here piece is not as "culturally daring" as you think.

You could probably make and "artistically meaningful" piece involving the torture and live bloodletting of a puppy, maybe intended to be about how socialism (or capitalism) sucks the life out of the innocent individual. To most people though, it would just look like gratuitous puppy torture.

Cultural relativism doesn't require that we accept "unclaimed" human bodies exposed in our museums or exhibits with animals taken out of their native environments and left to fight each other or cower in a corner defensively.

One day in a big Chinese city in a boiling hot day I saw a group of people staring at a shallow box with 20 or so chicken chicks. Some chicks were clearly dead, with more to come because there was no water or shade. No one was doing anything. They just stared. Maybe it was art? What I do know is that it represented a different way of looking at animals than I have. In any case, I expect this piece here is not as "culturally daring" as you think.

You could probably make and "artistically meaningful" piece involving the torture and live bloodletting of a puppy, maybe intended to be about how socialism (or capitalism) sucks the life out of the innocent individual. To most people though, it would just look like gratuitous puppy torture.

SORRY.

When I posted my comment it gave me weird pink box and told me there was something wrong with my "id", so I thought it hadn't posted. So I posted again. And the computer again personally insulted me with pink flavored attacks on my id. So I posted again...now I'm sorry.

@5 Your analogy is flawed. You put two fighting dogs into a pit and watch them tear each other to bits, and you're doing it for sport. You put together a piece like this and place it in the meaning-loaded context of an art museum, and you're doing it to make people think, to make a point.

It's not like I'm pro animal suffering in any way (vegetarian, won't buy leather, etc.), but if you're outraged by the animal cruelty in this piece, which I admittely haven't seen in person, I sure hope you're down there in the park at 4th and Yesler every Sunday night at 2 a.m. with blankets and warm meals, or at the SPCA every weekend adopting strays.

I think it's at least arguable that this piece does more to prevent animal cruelty than you're doing by decrying it.

animals are not here for our entertainment.

Yes, you're right, animals are here to suffer and struggle to survive, just like everything else on this planet.

And they suffer and struggle whether we're there to watch or not. But is the existence of spectators sufficient to turn it into art? Or is it the artificality of the setting? Or what?

All in all, I think I'd rather leave this kind of thing to Catherine Chalmers.

I read about a petaite who advocated that humans be the "moral intervener" when a cat tries to eat a mouse. I actually wish them luck in that effort.

Just to clarify: the animals certainly did have water. Carry on.

i'm not familiar with huang's work but theater of the world sounds like total shite.

I'd like to see Huang Yong Ping put in that container with all those creatures, and then coldly stand there an observe the Art results. Just saying.

*yawn*