Dana Schutz Emmett Till Painting

The current whitney biennial is no exception the art press has been awash this past week with reports of a protest staged in front of a painting of a disfigured emmett till lying in his casket.

Dana schutz emmett till painting. But a recent work has made her an incendiary figure. Dana schutz is a successful artist. The painting depicts the. When american artist dana schutz decided to paint the mutilated face of emmett till a 14 year old african american boy who was tortured and lynched by two white men in 1955 she said she intended.

She had said i wanted the world to see what they did to my baby. Dana schutz responds to the uproar over her emmett till painting at the whitney biennial by brian boucher mar 23 2017 in this mix some of the vitriol in what the artist coco fusco termed this multicultural melodrama has been aimed beyond schutz to the biennial curators who chose to include her work christopher lew and mia locks. Schutzs painting is a medium sized canvas depicting tills face and chest as he lies in his coffin. The 2017 whitney biennial while mostly well reviewed has been dominated by controversy over dana schutzs painting open casket based on a photograph of emmett till in his coffin.

Schutzs 2016 painting open casket derives from the photograph of the mutilated corpse of emmett till whose mother mamie till mobley insisted on an open casket at his funeral because she wanted her community to see what had happened to her son. Artnet news christian viveros faune was impressed with the work calling it a powerful painterly reaction to the infamous 1955 funeral photograph of a disfigured emmett till adding that the canvas makes material the deep cuts and lacerations portrayed in the original photo by means of cardboard relief. The open coffin photographs of the mutilated body of emmett till the teenager who was lynched by two white men in mississippi in 1955 served as a catalyst for the civil rights movement and have.