Philjames (born 1976) is an Australian artist known for his original approach to his art. His artwork is a kind of collages, he inserts into already known paintings of old masters images of various cartoon characters Looney Tunes and classic Disney cartoons. It turns out to be at least unusual, collages of the artist completely change the initial perception of the picture, allow you to look at the familiar works of art from a different angle, to find some new meanings in them.
Star Child
Instead of the usual rationality - a mockery on the verge of kitsch, when the seemingly frivolous, or even outright childish way of creating pictures allows to focus attention on the hidden, and often quite dark sides of our reality.
A mad and Hallucinating Deity.
However, this approach is not shared by everyone. The artist's paintings have often been the subject of various scandals, and we would like to tell you about one of them, which took place at the Blake Art Prize exhibition in Sydney.
Jesus Speaks to the Daughters of Jerusalem
On it, Philjames unveiled the painting “Jesus Addresses the Daughters of Jerusalem.” Instead of the face of Jesus Christ, it shows Goofy's face, with the kindly ghost Casper crying on the cross. Not surprisingly, many viewers took this picture as an outright mockery of Christianity. A hail of angry messages in social networks fell on Philjames, people often expressed themselves quite sharply, accusing the artist of mocking religion and the feelings of believers. There were many calls and the organizers of the exhibition with a demand to immediately remove the painting from the general exposition.
Jesus Speaks to the Daughters of Jerusalem. Fragment
Philjames himself was surprised and saddened by this reaction. “I have been creating paintings like this for 15 years, but I have never met such fierce criticism. Usually there are only 2-3 dissatisfied viewers, but my work does not have to please everyone, the search for new forms of expression in art is a painful process for the creator and requires a certain patience from the viewer, but only in this way you can not stand still. If I had painted familiar landscapes, no one would have paid proper attention to my paintings, because it had all been done hundreds of times before. However, later, when I looked at the painting through the eyes of an ordinary viewer, I realized that the level of acrimony in my painting is simply prohibitive and not everyone is ready to accept it. Threats have been made against the staff, and if they have any basis in fact, the painting had better be removed.”
A Game with Time and Infinity
Mayor Ned Mannun joined the chorus of dissatisfaction, saying that “the feelings of believers are more important than the desire of some artists to overly loudly declare themselves, and Goofy has nothing to do with Jesus Christ.”
The organizers eventually removed the painting from the exhibit. Philjames had no choice but to agree, but argued that such measures restricted free speech. But the mayor parried that art should unite people and respect religious feelings, not cause resentment and hatred. “People have the right to practice religion without fear of anyone's ridicule,” he said.
Jesus is placed in the Sepulture 2019
Philjames, though he went to Sunday school as a child, is an atheist. However, it is good for him that he exhibited such a painting in Sydney, and not somewhere in the orthodox Muslim East, and depicted Jesus Christ on it, and not the prophet Mohammed. In that case, things were hardly that innocuous for the artist.
And what do you think, whether the creators have the right to create such works of art - write in the comments.
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