From Cynthia HawkinsAuthor(s): Cynthia HawkinsSource: Art Journal, Vol. 50, No. 4, Censorship II (Winter, 1991), p. 119Published by: College Art AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/777338 .

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[Continued from p. 120] then teaching assistants, myself and Eileen Griffen, helped found the feminist newspaper "Goodbye to All That" before coming to the California Institute of the Arts in 1970. The paper was cited as one of the best of the new feminist

publications in the New York Times that year. Griffen and I also collaborated on the first of a se- ries of rape films using a raw meat

metaphor that same year, two

years before that image reap- peared in collaboration between

Lacy, myself, Chicago, and Orgel of the rape performance "Ablu- tions." Reading Lacy's account, referring to Kaprow's "developing theory . . . linked to feminist

analysis" (p. 65), I thought: the ideas have survived sans ma- trilineal attribution. -The writer is a project artist

formerly based in California and now in New York.

From Cynthia Hawkins: As an abstract painter concerned with the social, environmental, and political problems facing all of us, but one whose work isn't based on "correct politics," I thank you for the recent issue on "Constructed Painting," guest edited by Curt Barnes (AJ, Spring 1991).

I was particularly impressed with essays by Sam Gilliam, Jon- athan Santlofer, and Ken Sofer, which suggest that artists think and write about their work in a different manner than curators and critics.

For an artist, I think a discus- sion of one's work illustrates that

spoken or written language and visual language cannot truly meet and must be adjusted from time to time. To quote what Larry Brown says about the art-making process: "I see it as a consistent and ongoing process, mysterious and magical. It is still evolving" (p. 9). -The writer is Patricia Roberts Harris Fellow at Maryland Insti- tute, College ofArt.

Photography Credits

Courtesy Akademie der Kunste, Berlin, p. 84; Alinari/Art Resource, p. 63; Mary Bloom, p. 49 (fig. 7); Elijah Cobb, p. 34; Erro, p. 30 (Eye Body); Al Giese, p. 31; Lloyd Hamrol, p. 39; Dona Ann McAdams, p. 43; Eric Pollitzer, p. 66; Carolee Schneemann, p. 35; Frances Miller Smith, p. 40; Joseph Szaszfai, p. 61; Charlotte Victoria, p. 33; Zindman/Fremont, p. 69.

Index of Advertisers

Harry N. Abrams, Inc., p. 2 Arad Arts Project, p. 116

Cambridge University Press, p. 106 Catich Gallery, p. 116 Fashion Institute of Technology, inside front cover William H. Gerdts, p. 116 Harvard University Press, p. 118 Hill-Stone Incorporated, p. 114 Inverness Soapstone Distributors, p. 114 The Lion and the Lamb Peace Arts Center, p. 116

MIT Press, p. 6

Oxford University Press, pp. 97,110 Penguin USA, p. 117

Penn State Press, p. 93

Princeton University Press, p. 98

Rizzoli International Publications, p. 1

Thames and Hudson Inc., p. 4

David Tunick, p. 114

University of Chicago Press, p. 118

University of Delaware Press, p. 100 University of Texas Press, p. 112

University of Washington Press, p. 5

University Press of New England, p. 102

University Prints, p. 114 Alan Wbfsy Fine Arts, back cover

Yale University Press, inside back cover

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ART JOURNAL

119

From Adrian Piper: I want to thank you for the illu-

minating issue on feminist art

criticism, guest edited by Joanna Frueh and Arlene Raven. Before

reading it I had thought the

days when I was able to under- stand what feminist theorists were

saying were gone forever.

Congratulations. -The writer is an artist who teaches at Wellesley College.

From Jeanne Wilkinson: It is said that people who have had strokes recover the lower func- tions of their brains first, and that the speech coming from that re-

gion is of the expletive, four-letter- word variety. As their brains heal, they recover the ability to form more complex thoughts.

In this light, I ponder over

why our society is obsessed with

expletives. Why does a man like Robert Storr, for instance, in an editorial about free speech, de- fine the concept, in the "final analysis," to be a matter of "whether or not one may. . . yell 'Shit!' on stage in a publicly funded production-or 'fuck!'"' (AJ, Fall 1991, p. 12). And then, instead of exploring this odd statement or any other ideas about freedom of expression, he spends the rest of the article engaged in a metaphorical pissing contest with Hilton Kramer.

Am I to believe then, that

Hilton Kramer's thoughts and Ubu Roi's "gusto" are the impor- tant issues in First Amendment discussions? Am I to believe that "repressive decorum" (sup- posedly the "greatest threat we

face," besides "self-censorship") is responsible for the continuing censorship created by bad educa- tion in our ever-deteriorating, publicly funded school system, for people who can't read street

signs, much less Art Journal, for

people who fear and deny art un- less it comes from K Mart? What does "repressive decorum" have to do with the implicit and insid- ious forms of censorship caused

by sexism, racism, poverty, and consumerism?

I grew up in the '50s where I was censored by society through my relationships. I learned to "self-censor" as I saw that women who didn't were treated to ugly and even brutal behavior by their male associates and loved ones. I don't know how saying "fuck" on a

publicly funded stage or any- where else would have helped me or any other women I knew. The word itself is too often used

against women to be of any com- fort or benefit. The most impor- tant service to me would have been a listening ear.

I truly yearn for some grown- up, probing, intelligent, creative

thinking about the freedom and

responsibilities of free expres- sion. I did not see any evidence of this to speak of in Mr. Storr's edi- torial. What thinking there was seemed petty, limited, even delu- sional and dictatorial. I did, how- ever, appreciate seeing Map- plethorpe's pictures with all their

edgy, perhaps tragic, honesty. But now that we have seen the

pictures, how do we speak of them? What is their importance as art and idea? Do they speak of the human race and its obsession with its own form and function? Are they a mirror in which to gaze as the life of the earth disappears outside the perimeter of glass? Perhaps our narcissism and our

willingness to be apart from na- ture is a dead-end road.

I think soon we can write the last free speech, the epitaph of our lofty race, which passes truth while running after freedom. And our last words shall be: "They could not survive their own shit, but what the fuck?" -The writer is an artist who lives in Brooklyn and shows at Anita

Shapolsky Gallery, New York.

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