Many leading US artists are angry at what they perceive as self-censorship by major museums. It follows the decision by the National Gallery of Art in Washington, Tate Modern in London, The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, to delay the presentation of a retrospective by Philip Guston until 2024. He is regarded as one of America’s most influential postwar painters.
The galleries don’t want trouble and Guston’s later paintings feature men in hoods reminiscent of the Ku Klux Klan. The Klan paintings were first exhibited in 1970 when Guston abandoned his earlier abstractions to face down the evils he first saw as a Jewish child in Los Angeles. They were shown without incident in the US and the UK in 2003-04.
The decision to postpone has been condemned in an open letter by nearly leading 100 artists, curators and writers, young and old, black and white. Among the signatories are Matthew Barney, Nicole Eisenman, Charles Gaines, Ellen Gallagher, Wade Guyton, Rachel Harrison, Joan Jonas, Ralph Lemon, Julie Mehretu, Adrian Piper, Pope.L, Martin Puryear, Amy Sillman, Lorna Simpson, Henry Taylor, Stanley Whitney and Christopher Williams.
The delay is to let the institutions rethink their presentation of his later figurative paintings. According to a spokesperson for the National Gallery spokesperson these risk being “misinterpreted” today.
