...like everything that the Baltimore museum does, there's more than meets the eye here. When it comes right down to it, the meat of "Home & Beast" lies not in either half, but in the ampersand, the interstitial tissue linking the two seemingly unrelated parts.I'll leave aside Grandin's facilitation of the slaughter of millions of sentient animals every year to focus on the positive of this article, which is that this exhibit now has the opportunity to reach more people through exposure in this article, and that even people who don't visit the museum will get a taste of important animal advocacy issues by simply reading the review. For those out there advocating for animals, this serves as a reminder that there's many new, even subtle, potentially effective ways to reach people and to do your part to raise the consciousness of our fellow humans.
Perhaps "meat" is an unfortunate choice of words, seeing as how the show includes a prominent panel of wall text presenting 10 arguments for vegetarianism -- not just on behalf of animal welfare, but taking into consideration the impact of the meat industry on the environment and our health. Militant carnivores and animal-rights deniers, be advised: The propaganda is subtle but unavoidable.
How else to account for the jar of salsa on display (from Texas musician and author-turned-politician Kinky Friedman's Private Stock line)? As the wall label explains, proceeds from the sale of the designer condiment support Friedman's animal rescue and rehabilitation facility.
The message -- that we share this planet, our home, with other creatures and that we are, in fact, beasts ourselves -- comes across in the art, too.
[snip]
For my money, the most interesting offerings of "Home & Beast" are among its least visually arresting. A series of four photocopies of technical blueprints for livestock handling systems by Temple Grandin -- an autistic woman who has made a name for herself in the field of humane animal processing and who has been described as "the woman who thinks like a cow" -- may not even be art in the conventional sense. But Grandin's work, and her intuitive ability to imagine what livestock feel like -- to even accept the importance of how livestock feel -- makes a profound impact.
For more art that focuses on animal concerns, please visit AAFL's art links by hovering your cursor over the LINKS navbar button at the top of this page and navigating to the art section. A subfolder will pop-up, and you can choose from various artists working in different mediums and even an online gallery (no need to click until you find a link you're interested in).
Tags: art | advocacy
