The topic of this week’s show is Art and Obscenity. Specifically, we’re thinking about where art and obscenity intersect.

So, what exactly do we mean by “obscene”?The Supreme Court defines itas any material which "appeals to a prurient interest in sex, portrays sexual conduct in a patently offensive way," and which "does not have any serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value." Taken at face value, then, art—by definition—could never be obscene, and that would be the end of our discussion!

Given that the Supreme Court has also declared corporations to be people and money to be speech, we probably shouldn’t let their idiosyncratic interpretation of concepts dictate the way we talk about obscenity. So, instead of trying to define “obscene,” it might be more useful to start our discussion with an example of a work that is—or, at least, was—considered obscene.

One piece that comes to mind is Marcel Duchamp’s “Fountain,” a common variety porcelain urinal that Duchamp tried, unsuccessfully, to enter into an exhibition in New York in 1917 using the pseudonym “R. Mutt.” In its day, Duchamp’s work caused a huge scandal, with people calling vulgar, immoral, and indecent. Some even claimed the piece had zero artistic merit.

Despite its initial reception, Duchamp is now credited as having changed modern art forever with this piece. By using a ready-made object instead of painstakingly creating the work with his own two hands, in one bold (albeit lazy!) move, Duchamp invented what we now call ‘conceptual art.’

While Duchamp’s “Fountain” might seem fairly tame to us denizens of the twenty-first century, we can understand why people were up in arms about that work back in 1917. Indeed, there’s probably still plenty who think it doesn’t deserve to be called 'art' at all, but those judgments may have less to do with it being obsceneper seand more to do with it being conceptual.

不管你对杜尚的感觉如何，艺术界一直在勤奋地继续为我们提供许多让我们失望的新作品。就拿达米恩·赫斯特(Damien Hirst)这样的艺术家来说，他解剖大型动物，然后将它们悬浮在甲醛中，放在玻璃柜中展出。有人会说，他是那种把“骗局”放在“当代艺术”中的人物。还有备受争议的摄影师安德烈斯·塞拉诺(Andres Serrano)，他最臭名昭著的作品是一张十字架漂浮在自己尿液中的照片。它的名字，“尿基督”，被认为是太淫秽了，不能在广播中说，所以约翰和肯甚至不能在广播中提到它的名字!

But consider—Impressionism was also once considered offensive for its portrayals of common people doing common activities. So, what people tend to find obscene or shocking changes over time. I bet someday the works of Hirst, Serrano, and their ilk will seem tame, maybe even quaint. But in contrast to what? What will artists of the future do to shock and offend us? Where do we go after “Piss Christ”? And how far is too far?

Perhaps that’s what the Supreme Court was groping at in its lame attempt to define what counts as “obscene.” There is a line that divides genuine art from (mere) obscenity and we need to get clear on where that is so that obscenityfor its own sake不受第一修正案的保护然而，我认为，如果不承认有一类内容是淫秽的，同时也具有严重的艺术价值，我们就无法走得太远。正是在这个灰色地带，事情才变得真正有趣。

想象一下，例如，一个艺术家拍了一张非常漂亮的黑白照片，拍摄了一些人的兽性行为。这是否会从真正的艺术跨越到纯粹的淫秽?它显然符合最高法院定义的前两部分，但当我想到第三部分，或者作品是否有任何“严肃”的艺术价值时，我就陷入了困境。我们将如何着手决定这个问题?我们为什么会认为律师和法官的工作是决定什么才是真正的艺术?Who aretheyto decide what has serious artistic value?

Moreover, in this case I'm imagining, it seems like the law already has it covered. In most states in the U.S., for example, it’s a misdemeanor or even a felony to engage in acts of bestiality, so our fictional artist would simply be breaking laws that are already on the books without us needing any special laws just because the acts are done in the name of art.

So, let’s change the example slightly. Imagine our artist is a painter, not a photographer, and that the graphic images of bestiality were made without the use of any actual animals. Imagine further that the images are painted to look like B&W photos and they are perfectly rendered. It would be difficult to tell these images apart from images in our first example. Would you consider this art, obscenity, or a maybe bit of both? Would knowing these were paintings and not photos of actual animals make a difference in your assessment? While both examples are clear transgressions of some sort, the photorealistic paintings might only transgress our moral or cultural conventions, whereas the photos of actual animals also transgress the law.

So, while artists don’t have any special rights that puts them above the laws that the rest of us have to follow, they do have the right, nay, some might even say, thedutyto transgress conventions, to make us reconsider our values, beliefs and attitudes. In their role as subversives, iconoclasts, culture-jammers and agitators, surely artists are bound to produce work that offends, work that will be called “obscene” by their peers. If all art ever did was comfort and reassure us, it would fail in an essential task.