In October of 2014, the Metropolitan Opera in New York City staged The Death of Klinghoffer, a 1991 opera based on the murder of Leon Klinghoffer, a Jewish passenger killed during the hijacking of the cruise ship Achille Lauro in 1985. Suffering ill health and confined to a wheelchair, Klinghoffer was shot in the head and thrown overboard by members of the Palestine Liberation Front. The critically acclaimed opera had been staged globally to little controversy. Yet in one of the most culturally sophisticated cities in the world –– the sh*t hit the fan.
Protesters, many of whom hadn’t even seen the opera, demanded the Met cancel the production. According to the New York Times, one protester labeled the baritone a fascist and another called for the set to be burned to the ground. Peter Gelb, the Mets general manager, received death threats. Abraham Foxman, director of the Anti-Defamation League, a prominent Jewish organization, praised the Met and said the opera was not anti-Semitic. He received vitriolic emails, one labeling him a “kapo,” an insult referring to a Jewish inmate who oversaw fellow Jews in concentration camps.
The histrionics around the Met affair reminded me of a similar ruckus involving LEGO Concentration Camp, a 1996 work by Polish artist Zbigniew Libera. In 2002, the seven-piece set was exhibited at the Jewish Museum of New York City in a show entitled, Mirroring Evil: Nazi Imagery/Recent Art. The controversial exhibition received a great deal of press, most of it not so great. Troubled by the uproar, the LEGO Group urged Libera to withdraw the work from public view but eventually backed down. Polish officials pressured Libera to decline an invitation to exhibit at the Venice Biennale. "This is censorship all over again," Libera told the Los Angeles Times in 1997. "I created this work to inspire discussion, not to suppress it.” LEGO Concentration Camp continued to be shown internationally. Some people loved it. Many hated it, screamed bloody hell about it, and nobody died. There was debate, just as Libera had intended, and then it was over.
In my opinion, LEGO Concentration Camp is an exciting and compelling work. Libera pushed one of the most sacred and taboo subjects, the Holocaust, into a realm that was inconceivable: toys and play. And some 30 years later, his seminal work continues to provoke discourse. It now resides in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw, Poland.
The purpose of art is not to identify right or wrong. The great value of a work of art is that it does not tell people what to think or feel. Instead it offers them a window into their own experience of the object or image. And by observing their own individual reaction to what they are seeing (and experiencing) they are given the opportunity to examine their own feelings, assumptions and beliefs.
We can’t change the world. We can only change ourselves. Art is the way. Art challenges each and every one of us to decide what type of human being we want to be. To think for ourselves rather than conform. Art encourages us to be better despite cultural operating systems promoting apathy, prejudice, and hate.
The drama surrounding LEGO Concentration Camp and The Death of Klinghoffer reflects society’s inability to tolerate unorthodox ideas and differing points-of-view. The “agree to disagree” method of civil discourse is on life support. Individuals remain silent for fear of offending someone. Cancel culture is rampant, bullies use social media to shame and humiliate people, and censorship has become the norm though few seem to notice.
When a work of art is deemed offensive it does not mean it lacks value and I'm not talking about money. Art helps us to make meaning of why we exist. Someone once told me that we must turn toward our fears and lean into discomfort in order to break free of stories that don’t belong to us. Perhaps then we can create new perspectives and engage in more meaningful dialogues which embrace intolerance and suffering as well as acceptance and healing. The only way to find out is to be courageous enough to talk and listen to one another. We need art to help us with our journey along the path of the human condition because it provides a means from which to speak our deepest truths. Art is the doorway to the singular component vital to our very existence—freedom