An exhibition of modern British art was shown at the Te Papa Museum in Wellington, Zildland, a couple of years ago. There were not one but two controversial works that had the local god-bothering crowd up in arms and out on the streets. The whole brouhaha was made more interesting for us in that it was led by a former colleague of 'er indoors, Grahame Capill, a professional worrier of the first water and a minister in a church of the happy hand-clapping variety, but I repeat myself.
The first, and probably most controversial, of the two anathematised works of art was called "Virgin in a Condom". The work was literally that - a small plastic statue of Mary of the kind beloved of Roman Catholic children (I'm guessing here; no one else I know of likes them). The statue was inside what looked like a used condom. Well, it was a condom; it looked to be not new. The artist had justified the juxtaposition in a paragraph or so in the catalogue, but the local killjoys weren't having a bar of it. Death to the blasphemers, yadda, yadda, yadda.
The second piece really was a great work of art. It was called "Wrecked Last Supper" and was a photo-montage of a bunch of self-absorbed disciples eating a last supper. The only problem - and it was one that the misogynistic Catholic church was particularly vitriolic about - was that the "Christ" figure was a topless woman. Not a page 3 glamour model, just an ordinary woman.
It was a marvellous piece of work, and if I'd had the wall space - at least 10 feet long and 6 feet high - I'd have stolen it.
The artistic merits of "Virgin in a Condom" were certainly debatable - I put it roughly in the same category as lights going on and off and people modelling their own faeces - but the "Wrecked Last Supper" piece was pure, unadulterated and very clever, art. IMHO, of course.
- Pfranz
