It has also occurred to me that as a member, whether I go or not they already have my support. Sometimes the best way to protest is with your feet. So I have called Andrea Seaborn in the marketing department at the AGO. I did not speak to her directly because she was unavailable. I did however leave a voicemail. The basic message that I left was that I was disappointed that an institution such as the AGO was taking a position that denigrated an artist whose work they were promoting. I further stated that I would not be renewing my membership unless the promotion ended and a formal apology went out. I suspect that little ol' me will have little impact, but then at this point it is a matter of conscience.
To see the article that I read follow the link:
An Open Letter to the AGO About Frida Kahlo’s Unibrow - Shameless Magazine - your daily dose of fresh feminism for girls and trans youth
Update. I received a call from Steve Rayment, the Director of Marketing at the AGO. We had a good conversation. As a conversation is dynamic in nature it difficult to give it it's due here. Suffice to say, that the AGO seems to have weighed the potential for controversy in advance and decided that promotion trumped respect and reverence. I added that I thought in this day and age any sort of marketing that made fun of someone's body image even if "fun" was the intent, was misguided at best. I suggested that if they were looking for a way to play up Frida's personal style choice perhaps a campaign along the lines of Dove's campaign for real beauty would have been better (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dove_Campaign_for_Real_Beauty).
ReplyDeleteIn the end, I admitted that I am just one voice. Steve's feeling was that the public seemed very supportive of the campaign. Perhaps more voices are needed!
The comments after the blog post sited above were useful in expanding the discussion. Of interest to me was that the curator, Dot Tuer, was someone I worked with decades ago in a completely different line of work.
ReplyDeleteWow!!!!! I love Dot!!!!!! I did not realize she was the curator. I can't believe that she would have supported this line of marketing. I graduated from OCAD in 2004 and took a course from Dot on post-modernism in my last year. Not a year has gone be since then when I have not referenced her exemplary teaching style and what I learned in that class. I would gladly meet up with her again.
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