To think the BBC need to remove the Eric Gill sculpture?

[Twoshoesnewshoes]

Is there a thread on this? Couldn’t find one.

I’ve just been reading that someone has scaled the BBC building and attacked the sculpture by Eric Gill with a hammer.
Apparently it’s still being repaired from the last attack.
It prompted me to revisit info on the sculpture and sculptor.

AIBU in thinking it needs to be removed?

Eric Gill’s proclivities aren’t news, though.

Yes. Vile man.

Since when has paedophilia and incest been described as a proclivity?

No, neither were Colstens but growing awareness meant his statue got pulled down.
I meant, as the Eric Gill statue will yesterday need further repair, it’s an opportunity to actually remove it?

Is the statue any less good or artistic now you know about Eric Gill's crimes?

Should the Underground stop using Gill sans?

Gill was a monstrous man but his art was extra ordinary, would destroying his art erase his crimes?

Not sure. If it's artwork we wouldn't find acceptable from somebody else, I'd remove it.

Otherwise, I wouldn't remove artwork because of the artist's character or crimes.

And surely following the J Saville trauma, the BBC should be actively distancing themselves from associating with paedophilia?

Stick a Jimmy Saville medal round it's neck it's good to go. Good old BBC.

They are not associating themselves with paedophilia FFS! Anymore than a gallery displaying Carovaggios is associating themselves with murderers.

@Ginmonkeyagain @Mangledrake it’s a very reasonable point.
However, the sculpture depicts a child and a man. If we accept that art invites us to view the subject through the artist’s gaze then no, I don’t want to see that. I don’t want to look on a child as their abuser did.

how could that child consent to being viewed and shared in that way? I’m very uneasy about it.

If it was a statue of him, then yes. Just by him? No. I think there is a difference.

But Colston was the subject of the statue, not its sculptor.

Yes.

No I don't think it should be removed.

I disagree with the erasure of history. Hiding it, removing it, doesn’t mean it didn’t happen, and it prevents future generations from a true understanding of how we have developed over time. This goes for “updating” novels as well.

these things are of their time and should be known. Educate, place in contact by all means, but hiding the truth, and hiding from the truth is a recipe for disaster IMO. We are teaching people to runaway and pretend, rather than face up our national, and world history. Censorship in this way is appalling.

No. Do we burn all of gaugins paintings then? Or ban listening to Wagner as he was such a raging antisemite? Maybe Picasso too, he was quite a groomer. Where do you stop?

I really don't buy into the "judge the art not the artist" thing.
It's a depiction of a naked child with an adult male by a sculptor who routinely raped his kids and his dog.
There's not exactly a shortage of great art in this country - get it down and shove it in a gallery and put up a Barbara Hepworth.

Should cities such as Bristol and Glasgow pull down all of their 18th and 19th century buildings which were built by the money of slavers and colonisers?

should Rome destroy its monuments which again were built using the money of slavers and colonisers?

I think that these controversial statues she have a dedicated Museum. Although it's rightly placed, the BBC loves and protects pedophiles hiding in plain sight.

It’s not limited to statues. It’s the principle - buildings, books, artwork, so much is “problematic”. Learn about it, learn from it, but it’s not possible to remove it all and pretend we live in some plastic bubble outside of the history that has brought us all to where we are now.

@HRTeatime @crumpet I do agree to some extent, however in this instance the statue is of a child, allegedly modelled on his daughter, who he sexually abused.
so the actual subject is a victim of abuse.

Also the removal of these statues would give work to modern sculptors and perhaps some of the women who shaped our welfare rights, prisons, education for the poor, health and MH services could be honoured.

crumpet · Today 10:22
Should cities such as Bristol and Glasgow pull down all of their 18th and 19th century buildings which were built by the money of slavers and colonisers?

should Rome destroy its monuments which again were built using the money of slavers and colonisers?”

This.

The statue is gross and disturbing. A man holding a naked child. FFS. A wrecking ball would be a better idea.

The statue is of Prospero and Ariel - two Shakesperian characters