BS: Starving a dog to death publicly = art?

Subject: RE: BS: Starving a dog to death publicly = art?
From: GUEST,caitlín
Date: 24 Apr 08 - 04:15 PM

Being concerned about this doesn't mean thinking that it's more important than the suffering of children, which of course it isn't. But why the assumption that because someone's angry about the deliberate mistreatment-for-show (however far it went) of a dog, that their priorities are screwed? That's quite a judgmental leap, and (in my case anyway) it's false. A greater wrong does not mean that the lesser wrong is nullified.

As for fluffy and dewy-eyed, did you SEE those pictures? Whatever about the artist's creative purpose and his ambiguity, we still only have his word for it that it all happened as he said it did. That on its own does not convince me. Whether this issue should be ignored because there are worse things to worry about, which there always are, is another subject.

Subject: RE: BS: Starving a dog to death publicly = art?
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 24 Apr 08 - 04:11 PM

There were reports yesterday in the British press that the donkey sanctuary near Sidmouth receives £20m a year in donations compared with £17m for battered wives' charities....

I also yesterday received an e-mail from BB seeking signatures for this
petition
Kitty

Subject: RE: BS: Starving a dog to death publicly = art?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 24 Apr 08 - 03:05 PM

"there's really no implication that the artist was "more concerned with the fate of starving dogs than the fate of starving children"."

The Royal Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) was founded six decades before the National Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) - 1824 as opposed to 1884.

The majority of people will 'not hear', or gloss over reports of children dying in their hundreds, but if one fluffy, dewy-eyed doggie gets kicked, those same people will be up in arms.

I'm not advocating animal abuse, and certainly not in the so-called name of "art" - far from it; but I am suggesting that maybe some need to sort their priorities.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Starving a dog to death publicly = art?
From: frogprince
Date: 24 Apr 08 - 11:20 AM

I was writting while Bee posted; I wasn't upset enough with Rap to "jump on the bandwagon" after the point was already made.

Subject: RE: BS: Starving a dog to death publicly = art?
From: frogprince
Date: 24 Apr 08 - 11:17 AM

I'm just a bit surprised at Repaire; whatever the other merits and implications of this, there's really no implication that the artist was "more concerned with the fate of starving dogs than the fate of starving children".
I don't know that I could fault the artist for pretending to do something vile to force attention to a tragic situation. It seems like a major stretch of credibility to think that everyone connected with the gallery, and everyone aware of the situation, would have allowed the "real thing" to happen. But if Snopes et al can't disprove it, I certainly can't.

Subject: RE: BS: Starving a dog to death publicly = art?
From: Bee
Date: 24 Apr 08 - 11:05 AM

Rapaire: read my post. The artist was outraged that a human being was killed by dogs and no one cared. The attitude towards street dogs was secondary.

Susan: the gallery Director stated the dog was walked. Also, galleries will put up with a lot of disgusting or unsanitary aspects of art - remember the Meat Dress, made by a Toronto artist a few years ago and displayed for quite a while in a major gallery? And the gallery in question is in Costa Rica, which may or may not have less strict sanitary regulations.

Caitlin, my education, knowledge, experience, and the Director's statement (which I'll continue to try to re-find) all tell me that my post is as close to the truth as you're going to get. It is in the artist's interest to be ambivalent in order to maintain the integrity of his premise.

Subject: RE: BS: Starving a dog to death publicly = art?
From: wysiwyg
Date: 24 Apr 08 - 10:55 AM

Hard to picture any public facility director allowing any animal to be at large after hours, or even tied up. Dogs poop and pee, ya know, besides being a health hazard, bite hazard, allergy hazard.....

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Starving a dog to death publicly = art?
From: Bobert
Date: 24 Apr 08 - 10:51 AM

Seems like a good PR stunt...

We organized a "puppy burn" back 'round '67 at VCU and got about 1000 students show up who couldn't have cared less about Vietnam and, of course, there was no puppy but...

... a danged good way to get a few folks thinkin' about the killin' that was going on in Vietnam...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Starving a dog to death publicly = art?
From: Rapparee
Date: 24 Apr 08 - 10:32 AM

To my sense of aesthetics that's as stupid (even if no animal was harmed) as "postmodern deconstructionism." If an animal WAS harmed it should be treated as a criminal act and punished accordingly.

And why was the "artist" more concerned with the fate of starving dogs than the fate of starving children?

Subject: RE: BS: Starving a dog to death publicly = art?
From: GUEST,caitlín
Date: 24 Apr 08 - 10:26 AM

A very fine post Bee - but I'm only wondering whether to believe them or not. The artist made his intention clear enough, but WAS no animal hurt? We don't know and probably never will.

Subject: RE: BS: Starving a dog to death publicly = art?
From: Bee
Date: 24 Apr 08 - 10:22 AM

I can't find it at the moment, but a month or more ago I found and presented on another forum a statement from the Director of the actual gallery where the event was staged. It appeared to be a legitimate gallery website.

The Gallery Director stated that the dog was a street dog, that it was fed and watered and exercised except for the fairly short periods it was tied in the gallery space. After hours, it was given the run of a large part of the gallery. Unfortunately (according to the director), although they made every effort to keep the dog inside, a maintenance person accidentally let it out of the building, after which they were unable to find it again.

The artist stated that his doing this was to point out the hypocrisy of people getting all worked up over the fate of a dog they would normally allow to starve in the streets anyway, while also having no emotional or sympathetic response at all to the recent death, by being attacked by dogs, of a homeless man the artist knew.

I think the artist expected and desired the responses he's gotten, because he believes it proves his point. I believe most of this piece was theatrical in nature, like almost every other performance artwork with animals I've ever seen, many of which have elicited similar responses in spite of the fact no animal was actually hurt in the process of the artwork.

I think my estimation of the incident is backed up by the Costa Rican Ministry of Art & Culture's continued support for the artist, as they are well aware of this controversy and most likely investigated thoroughly.

Do I think it was a good piece of art? Actually, no, it is too derivative of pieces performed as early as the late sixties with dead rabbits, and the early seventies with a German artist who pretended to be starving a cat in a closed box in a gallery, and various other artists since then. Great public outrage accompanied those works as well, and often people recalled the piece but not the reality behind the piece (no animal actually abused).

Why am I familiar with this kind of art? Because I spent the late sixties and early seventies attending art colleges and schools in Canada and the Netherlands which were closely affiliated with and sometimes taght by the artists that were at the time well known for their outrageous pieces. I know the territory.

Subject: BS: Starving a dog to death publicly = art?
From: GUEST,caitlín
Date: 24 Apr 08 - 09:59 AM

No one seems to be able to tell if this is a hoax or not. Even the strongest debunkers aren't really sure, including the humane organisations.

The story is that an artist named Guillermo Habacuc Vargas caught a stray dog from the streets, put a rope around its neck, tied it to a corner of a museum exhibition room, and left it there without food or any other life-necessities until it died of hunger, in full view of the public, with slogans on the wall above lettered in dried dogfood pellets.   

Plenty of pictures, for what that's worth - a YouTube clip which gives mostly the wall-messages, and elsewhere a series of stills (the same few shots - who took them?) showing a dog in the stages of starvation, a fur-covered skeleton of an animal which in itself can't be faked, however he got that way.

Google " Guillermo Habacuc Vargas " and take a look around.

The truly objective observers - SPCA and the like - can't say exactly what took place. Some blogs are outraged, there are petitions in every language, and other sites cynically dismiss it as a hoax - but that comes down to being no more than their personal opinions. No reliable source has been able to confirm facts one way or the other. The only reports that this was a publicity stunt come from Vargas and the museum. But after all the fury, they would, wouldn't they? They've never produced the one thing which would prove their case - the live dog. What happened to it, if it didn't die? Oh, right, it ran away - on those emaciated, weak legs, from that large public building. The only evidence of their innocence and they lose it. My other car's a Porsche.

Snopes has classified it as Undetermined

http://www.snopes.com/critters/crusader/vargas.asp   

http://www.hoax-slayer.com/starving-dog-art.shtml

So what do you think? True? False?   

In any case it's disturbing that Vargas could use an animal in this way, even if the most lurid details are exaggerated - they're built on SOMEthing. And then go on to be honored by the Costa Rican Ministry of Art & Culture as their country's representative at an important Central American exhibition. Even if no more animals are mistreated/killed - and the jury's still out on that one - he's sure got himself a lot of attention. At the very least I don't think he deserves to profit from it but he probably will.