Wednesday, June 03, 2015

Brandis arts-funding protest

The Australian Arts Minister George Brandis has taken $104m of the funding previously distributed by the arms-length Australia Council and moved it, without warning, to his own Department where he has the say on where it is spent. (Here is a thoughtful comment by the Music Trust)

Zwei Halbakte mit Brandis
In response the George Brandis Live Art Experience Facebook page has been established to which artists are posting images of paintings with Brandis photoshopped into them. In just 3 days it has become more popular than George Brandis' own page.

This is my contribution. I modified Zwei Halbakte (Two semi-nudes) by Otto Mueller who was declared a Degenerate Artist by the National Socialists in Germany in the 1930s. I tried uploading it without the yellow bar covering the breasts, but it disappeared almost immediately .... Facebook doesn't  like nipples (although presumably they don't mind male nipples).

The page is growing and I notice someone has just photoshopped Brandis into the famous Demi Moore photograph.

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