{"id":13913,"date":"2023-01-15T19:20:27","date_gmt":"2023-01-16T02:20:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/?p=13913"},"modified":"2023-01-16T11:39:21","modified_gmt":"2023-01-16T18:39:21","slug":"the-embrace-does-not-convey-greatness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/2023\/01\/the-embrace-does-not-convey-greatness.html","title":{"rendered":"The Embrace Does Not Convey Greatness"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>The Embrace<\/em>, a new sculpture dedicated to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and his wife Coretta Scott King, has turned out to be contentious rather than unifying.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_13921\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-13921\" style=\"width: 320px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-13921\" src=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/embrace_2-400x285.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"320\" height=\"228\" srcset=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/embrace_2-400x285.jpg 400w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/embrace_2-300x214.jpg 300w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/embrace_2-768x548.jpg 768w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/embrace_2.jpg 900w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 320px) 100vw, 320px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-13921\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">\u201cThe Embrace.\u201d Hank Willis Thomas. Bronze. 2023. Photo: Twitter \/ @KyleH4real<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Black conceptual artist Hank Willis Thomas won the commission to create the monument now displayed in the Boston Common of Massachusetts. What Thomas came up with is a headless bronze structure\u2014a jumble of hands, arms, and shoulders meant to represent the historic couple. The fabrication measuring 20 feet long by 26 feet wide, depicts only the hands, arms, and shoulders of the civil rights activists. In the mind of this artist&#8230; <em>The Embrace<\/em> does not convey greatness.<\/p>\n<p><em>The Embrace<\/em> was dedicated and unveiled on Jan. 13, 2023, just before Martin Luther King Jr. Day on Jan. 16, 2023. It sits in the Boston Common near the Parkman Bandstand. In fact it is located on the exact location where King gathered 20,000 people in 1965 to protest against segregation in public schools; the very first such demonstration in the Northeast.<\/p>\n<p>On the morning of Jan. 14, 2023, my wife showed me a short video of the unveiling of <em>The Embrace <\/em>(shown below). I watched the plastic tarp drop to the ground to reveal something I couldn\u2019t identify. My first response was to blurt out, \u201cwhat IS that?\u201d<\/p>\n<div style=\"width: 1280px;\" class=\"wp-video\"><!--[if lt IE 9]><script>document.createElement('video');<\/script><![endif]-->\n<video class=\"wp-video-shortcode\" id=\"video-13913-1\" width=\"1280\" height=\"720\" preload=\"metadata\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"video\/mp4\" src=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/the_embrace.mp4?_=1\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/the_embrace.mp4\">https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/the_embrace.mp4<\/a><\/video><\/div>\n<p>The angle of the video presented a baffling jumble of hands grasping at&#8230; a lump, a blob, I didn\u2019t know. Then a different angle offered an even more unfortunate view; apparently I wasn\u2019t the only one to see it. Social media lit up with incredulous remarks that <em>The Embrace<\/em> looked like\u2014and I\u2019m embarrassed to say this, two giant hands holding up an immense flaccid phallus&#8230; either that or a prodigious turd. Surely this was an embarrassing blunder made by the artist, it couldn\u2019t possibly have been intentional. Yet there it is, the perfect example of the bewilderment, confusion, and lack of coherency in today\u2019s postmodern art.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_13931\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-13931\" style=\"width: 599px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-13931\" src=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/the_embrace.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"599\" height=\"478\" srcset=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/the_embrace.jpg 900w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/the_embrace-300x239.jpg 300w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/the_embrace-400x319.jpg 400w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/the_embrace-768x613.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 599px) 100vw, 599px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-13931\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">\u201cThe Embrace.\u201d Hank Willis Thomas. Bronze. 2023. The statue being installed. Photo: Twitter<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Postmodern art is not a civilizing force, it is nihilistic and its mission has always been to remove the idea of beauty from art. The virus began in 1917 when Marcel Duchamp signed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tate.org.uk\/art\/artworks\/duchamp-fountain-t07573\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">a porcelain urinal<\/a> with the nom de plume \u201cR. Mutt,\u201d then displayed the toilet he titled <em>Fountain<\/em> in an exhibit hosted by the Society of Independent Artists. Beauty isn\u2019t the only thing that has been stripped from art. We\u2019ve reached the point where we can\u2019t even produce a statue of a true American hero; the attempt only gets us a bizarre and ugly decapitated creature seemingly designed by a special effects studio for a schlocky sci-fi flick.<\/p>\n<p>My criticism of Thomas\u2019 <em>The Embrace<\/em> is in part based upon my respect for Martin Luther King Jr. To be honest, Martin deserves so much more. As a pre-teen I followed his activities closely. I was nine-years-old when I watched television news reports of Martin and 200,000 followers <a href=\"https:\/\/kinginstitute.stanford.edu\/encyclopedia\/march-washington-jobs-and-freedom\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">marching on Washington D.C.<\/a> for jobs and freedom; it was there that he gave his most famous oratory&#8230; \u201cI Have a Dream.\u201d Martin was my entry point into the American Civil Rights Movement.<\/p>\n<p>When I was thirteen-years-old in 1967, Martin began to speak out against <a href=\"https:\/\/kinginstitute.stanford.edu\/encyclopedia\/vietnam-war\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">the Vietnam war<\/a>: \u201cThe bombs in Vietnam explode at home\u2014they destroy the dream and possibility for a decent America.\u201d My generation listened, and we followed his vision that we could stop the war. I remind the reader that Martin\u2019s words concerning the Vietnam war are still relevant, or haven\u2019t you noticed that we are in a proxy war with nuclear armed Russia over Ukraine?<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_13938\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-13938\" style=\"width: 340px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-13938\" src=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/martin_and_coretta.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"340\" height=\"474\" srcset=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/martin_and_coretta.jpg 450w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/martin_and_coretta-300x419.jpg 300w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/martin_and_coretta-400x558.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 340px) 100vw, 340px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-13938\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">\u201cThe Embrace\u201d was supposedly inspired by this photo of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. hugging his wife Coretta Scott King on Oct. 14, 1964, the day Martin won the Nobel Peace Prize.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>It supposedly took five years to make <em>The Embrace<\/em>, a 20-ton bronze constructed of 609 individual pieces, all cast at the Walla Walla Foundry in the state of Washington.<\/p>\n<p>Thomas worked with <a href=\"https:\/\/massdesigngroup.org\/index.php\/work\/design\/embrace-hank-willis-thomas\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">MASS Design Group<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.embraceboston.org\/memorial\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Embrace Boston<\/a>, non-profits in Boston with politically correct mission statements, to design the 1965 Freedom Plaza where <em>Embrace<\/em> is publicly displayed. Unbelievably, the \u201cBIPOC Centric\u201d Embrace Boston raised $8 million to produce the work and raised an extra $2.5 mil to preserve it.<\/p>\n<p>Even more inconceivable is the idea that <em>The Embrace<\/em> project had to be approved by multiple state agencies before it could be realized. The Mayor\u2019s Office of Arts and Culture, the Boston Arts Commission, Boston Parks and Recreation Department\u2014all the people involved in the project did not see in <em>The Embrace<\/em> what millions immediately saw when it was unveiled.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s beyond belief that city officials of Boston are hoping <em>Embrace<\/em> will be a tourist attraction comparable to the Statue of Liberty. Squad member and Democrat Congresswoman of Massachusetts Ayanna Pressley, who was at the unveiling, told those assembled that people from around the world will visit <em>The Embrace<\/em> to pay tribute to the Kings. She\u2019s positively delusional.<\/p>\n<p>On the MASS Design Group website, the organization poses a self-righteous and hypocritical question: \u201cHow can we fill the voids left in America\u2019s public spaces, once we have removed the memorials that divide us? How can we demand more memorials that unite us around our common humanity, love, and empathy?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Starting in 2020 leftwing mobs graffitied or tore down bronze statues of Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Ulysses S. Grant, Francis Scott Key, Andrew Jackson, Frederick Douglass and other notable Americans. Are these the \u201cmemorials that divide us\u201d that MASS Design alludes to? Who exactly wanted the statues damaged, destroyed, \u201cremoved\u201d?<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_13946\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-13946\" style=\"width: 600px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-13946\" src=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/fifty_fourth_regiment_gaudens.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"436\" srcset=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/fifty_fourth_regiment_gaudens.jpg 900w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/fifty_fourth_regiment_gaudens-300x218.jpg 300w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/fifty_fourth_regiment_gaudens-400x291.jpg 400w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/fifty_fourth_regiment_gaudens-768x558.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-13946\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">\u201cMemorial to Robert Gould Shaw and the Massachusetts Fifty-Fourth Regiment.\u201d Augustus Saint-Gaudens. Bronze sculpture on Boston Common. Photo: Mark Vallen.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>I visited the Boston Common in 2019. I was stunned by the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nps.gov\/articles\/the-robert-gould-shaw-memorial.htm?utm_source=article&amp;utm_medium=website&amp;utm_campaign=experience_more&amp;utm_content=small\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><em>Memorial to Robert Gould Shaw and the Massachusetts Fifty-Fourth Regiment<\/em><\/a>, a masterwork bronze sculpture by the artist <a href=\"https:\/\/infogalactic.com\/info\/Augustus_Saint-Gaudens\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Augustus Saint-Gaudens<\/a>. Created in 1897 the sculpture commemorates the men of the Fifty-Fourth Regiment, a Union Army military unit of free black men who fought in the Civil War under the command of a white officer named, Robert Gould Shaw.<\/p>\n<p>The 54th fought a hand-to-hand battle with the Confederates at Fort Wagner on July 18, 1863. Captain Shaw was killed and 280 of his men were killed, wounded, or captured; the battle was lost but the courageous 54th joined the immortals. Saint-Gaudens gave them a proper memorial. It should be noted that on June 3, 2020, Black Lives Matter protestors covered with graffiti the granite base that holds the statue; they spray-painted the slogans &#8220;ACAB&#8221; (All Cops Are Bastards), &#8220;F**k 12&#8221; (F**k Police) and &#8220;BLM.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Pre-Renaissance European artists created the school of classical realist sculpture\u2014and Hank Willis Thomas, despite his postmodern Afrocentric vision, has not entirely abandoned that school. Over the years realist sculptors have created innumerable sculptures on the subject of people embracing. Women embracing their newborn babies, or mournfully embracing their dead warriors. Men embracing in solidarity and friendship, etc. These moving artworks express compassion, dignity, and a deep humanism; precisely what\u2019s missing in the strange and freakish <em>Embrace<\/em>.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_13949\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-13949\" style=\"width: 599px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-13949\" src=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/embrace_4.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"599\" height=\"369\" srcset=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/embrace_4.jpg 900w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/embrace_4-300x185.jpg 300w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/embrace_4-400x247.jpg 400w, https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/embrace_4-768x474.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 599px) 100vw, 599px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-13949\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">\u201cThe Embrace.\u201d Hank Willis Thomas. Bronze. 2023. Photo: Twitter \/ @chipgoines<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>It should have been foreseen that the postmodern structure conjured up by Thomas would be met with ridicule; that\u2019s the tragedy of <em>The Embrace<\/em> and postmodernism\u2014the monument should have been magnificent, but instead it invites mockery. It reminds me of two other recent public art debacles. The postmodern architect Thomas Heatherwick designed a sixteen-story walk-through sculpture he called <a href=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/2022\/01\/the-tragedy-of-vessel-staircase-to-nowhere.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><em>Vessel<\/em><\/a>. Located at the center of swanky Hudson Yards in Manhattan, NYC, it opened in March of 2019. The $200 million edifice was touted by politicians and contemporary art aficionados&#8230; until people started to commit suicide by flinging themselves from the 150-foot-high building. The city closed <em>Vessel<\/em> to the public.<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m also thinking of the Black postmodernist <a href=\"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/2021\/06\/sanford-biggers-is-not-an-oracle.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Sanford Biggers<\/a>, who in 2021 was asked to create and display one of his statues at the Fifth Avenue entrance to Rockefeller Center, NYC. Consumed by identity politics, Biggers created <em>Oracle<\/em>, a massively preposterous 25-foot tall bronze statue that fused a gigantic African mask to a Greco-Roman female goddess. Biggers meant the statue as a serious critique of the \u201cracist\u201d architectural artworks that embellish Rockefeller Center, but <em>Oracle<\/em> was simply ridiculous.<\/p>\n<p>To add insult to injury, social media is burning with sarcastic memes and scoffing comments regarding <em>The Embrace<\/em>, a few witticism from the Twitterati I include here.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u201cHow long did it take Hunter (Biden) to complete this?<\/p>\n<p>This is a laughable legacy to a wonderful man.<\/p>\n<p>Is it really that hard to get a decent MLK statue?<\/p>\n<p>He deserves way better than this atrocity.<\/p>\n<p>What an insult to the man and the moment.<\/p>\n<p>King had a dream. Boston Common has a nightmare.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>&#8230; and my favorite observation: \u201cThe West is no longer capable of creating anything beautiful.\u201d Many see Thomas\u2019 <em>The Embrace<\/em> as a work of genius, obviously I\u2019m not one of them, but <a href=\"https:\/\/news.artnet.com\/art-world\/hank-willis-thomas-martin-luther-king-jr-embrace-monument-boston-2242679\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">the art press certainly plays along<\/a>. On Aug. 11, 1956, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered an address in Chicago, Illinois <a href=\"https:\/\/kinginstitute.stanford.edu\/king-papers\/documents\/birth-new-age-address-delivered-11-august-1956-fiftieth-anniversary-alpha-phi\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">where he said<\/a>: &#8220;We need leaders not in love with money but in love with justice. Not in love with publicity but in love with humanity.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The same could be said about artists.<\/p>\n<p>_______________________________________<\/p>\n<p><strong>UPDATE:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Jan. 14, 2023:<\/strong> Seneca Scott, cousin of Coretta Scott King, wrote an essay for the social-democratic website <a href=\"https:\/\/compactmag.com\/article\/a-masturbatory-homage-to-my-family\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">COMPACT<\/a>. He wrote: &#8220;Ten million dollars were wasted to create a masturbatory metal homage to my legendary family members\u2014one of the all-time greatest American families.&#8221; <strong>Jan. 15, 2023:<\/strong> The New York Post prints banner headline <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2023\/01\/15\/woke-mlk-penis-statue-insults-black-community-coretta-scott-king-kin\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Woke $10M MLK &#8216;penis&#8217; statue insults black community: Coretta Scott King kin<\/a>. The NYPost quotes Seneca Scott: &#8220;The mainstream media was reporting on it like it was all beautiful, &#8217;cause they were told they had to say that. If you had showed that statute to anyone in the &#8216;hood, they&#8217;d have been like, &#8216;No, absolutely not.'&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Embrace, a new sculpture dedicated to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and his wife Coretta Scott King, has turned out to be contentious rather than unifying. Black conceptual artist Hank Willis Thomas won the commission to create the monument now displayed in the Boston Common of Massachusetts. What Thomas came up with is a headless bronze structure\u2014a jumble of&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_kadence_starter_templates_imported_post":false,"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[37,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-african-american","category-postmodernism-remodernism"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13913"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13913\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/art-for-a-change.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}