Case Study:Obscene Art

Recently a piece of art on campus was stolen. The piece was found in a faculty member’s office. When asked about the painting, the faculty member said the piece was offensive and inappropriate for BYU-I, so the faculty member removed it from general view taking care not to damage it in any way.

In response, to help the campus community better understand the purpose of art at BYU-I, the school decided to revisit the criteria by which art is selected. You have been asked to join the committee that oversees the selection art work (including, but not limited to, plays, music, sculpture, film, paintings) to be performed or displayed on the BYU-Idaho campus. As part of your committee responsibilities, you have been asked to draft specific criteria against which current and future works can be judged.

Your committee has been asked to include specific criteria or guidelines that can be used to determine what is or is not considered inappropriate or “obscene.” Your criteria should address content, context, and form. Content refers to what is being displayed or performed in the work. Context refers to when and why the piece was created as well as where it will be displayed. Form refers to the materials from which the piece was made or the style or genre of the piece. Create two lists: criteria for artwork which is not acceptable on campus, and criteria for artwork which is appropriate for campus art and performances. For example, if your criteria were to specify no pornographic or graphically sexual subject matter, it would then need to specify what constitutes “pornographic or graphically sexual.”