On Cultural Justice and Cultural Revenge

A thought-provoking article regarding the acute (Canadian?)
question: ""Whether a person should be allowed to make art about
people from another culture''. The occasion: a new book by
British born Canadian photographer Becky Mackie James:
""Something to Live For, Something to Reach for''. The book
consists of photographs and interviews of Indian/Metis students
of the Native Survival School in Saskatoon (CDN). The author
refers to the the so-called Women's Press Debate earlier in 1989
which posed the related question of whether white writers should
be allowed to publish work in which they adopted the voices of
persons of colour. The author gives four reasons which justify
the making of art about people of another culture: 1. we no
longer live in a society with clearly defined cultural
boundaries; 2. preventing a person from making art about people
from another culture allows it to cultivate its own stereotypes
(referring to Robert Frank's ""The Americans'' which showed
aspects of culture that most Americans were either unwilling or
simply unable to recognize); 3. Art rooted in the Western
tradition is affected by a preoccupation with morality; 4. the
most compelling argument, according to the author, lie in the
very reactions such art evokes. The author finally states that
""one variable that has nothing and yet everything to do with
making art about another culture is the most incendiary of all -
when the economic gap between cultures grows too wide''. ""The
issue no longer becomes one of conflicts among values, aethetic
or otherwise; it becomes one of conflicts among classes''.
""Criticizing a person who makes art about another culture then
has little to do with achieving cultural justice; it becomes a
form of cultural revenge.''


Citaten:
Curtis, E.: The North American Indian
Norbese Philip, M.: Gut Issues in Babylon: Racism and Anti-Racism in the Arts (Fuse, Apr. 1989)
Kundera, M.: The Art of the Novel (1988)
Harris, P.: Another Way of Being - Photographs of Spence Bat NWT (1976)
Rosler, M.: In, around, and afterthoughts (on documentary photography)