Fw: Latest articles on the Powers/Wennekers case

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Latest articles on the Powers/Wennekers case

 

Skinning of cat divides art community: 'Between art and snuff':

Gallery's directors stand by the accused

National Post Thu 19 Jul 2001 News A1 / Front

by Foster Smith

 

TORONTO - The directors of an avant-garde gallery in Toronto have come under

fire for their refusal to denounce two artists accused of the torture

killing of a cat.

 

Jesse Power, a 21-year-old Ontario College of Art & Design student, and

Anthony Ryan Wennekers, 24, were charged on May 30 with cruelty to animals

and mischief. A third man remains at large.

 

The men allegedly videotaped the black, white and grey cat's ordeal. The

case is before the courts.

 

The gallery, Art System, which is funded by the art college's student union,

became embroiled in the debate when co-directors Jubal Brown and Daniel

Borins appeared at Mr. Power's bail hearing to support the artist, who has

exhibited previous work at the gallery and whom they consider a friend.

 

Mr. Power is also scheduled to exhibit some of his work at the gallery in

August, but it's not clear whether that will go ahead.

 

Mr. Power has gone on record in a local newspaper defending the video as a

work of art -- a comment on the death and suffering of animals used for

meat.

 

Toronto Police Detective Gordon Scott said the 17-minute videotape is the

most difficult thing he has ever watched.

 

" After a couple of minutes, I was actually rooting for the cat to die to

avoid the cruelties being inflicted upon it, " he said.

 

Mr. Brown and Mr. Borins have made it clear they do not condone acts of

cruelty to animals. Mr. Brown, a vegetarian who owns two cats, said he finds

the idea of killing cats " simply horrible. "

 

" I don't support the killing of animals for food or art, " he said.

 

" But whether it is art is not for us to answer. "

 

Mr. Brown is no stranger to controversy. In 1996, he gained infamy by

ingesting primary-coloured foods and vomiting on two paintings he considered

" banal " -- a seascape by Raoul Dufy at the Art Gallery of Ontario and a

Mondrian at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

 

Neither painting was damaged and no charges were laid. Mr. Brown said at the

time his protest was meant " to destroy art, to liberate individuals and

living creatures from its banal, oppressive representation. "

 

Art System's position has since been reinforced by an official statement

from Bill Pusztai, chairman of the student union at the Ontario College of

Art and Design.

 

" The actions on the videotapes are abhorrent, immoral and illegal, " Mr.

Pusztai said. " But it is not our role to be arbiters of what is and what

isn't art. "

 

Cathy GordonMarsh, a local artist who has mounted the boycott, says taking a

stand on the artistic merit of such acts is essential.

 

" It reflects on us as an arts community, " she said. " I am very willing to

say it is not art for the reason that it includes an unwilling partner. It

is the difference between art and snuff. "

 

Mr. Borins said the fate of Mr. Power's scheduled show at Art System is now

in doubt. Police have seized all of his video work for review and the

gallery is looking into whether it can show any of his work without fear of

facing charges itself.

 

Mr. Borins also made it clear Art System has no desire to show the tape of

the cat's skinning and death.

 

" We're not idiot provocateurs, " he said. " It's like showing a snuff movie --

it's illegal. "

 

Both Mr. Brown and Mr. Borins have defended their decision to attend Mr.

Power's bail hearing, saying they were only there to support a friend.

 

" We were concerned that Jessie is messed up and in serious trouble, " Mr.

Borins said. " We're also concerned that police confiscated all his previous

artwork and might try to use it against him as character evidence. "

 

Since current laws relating to cruelty to animals carry only a maximum

six-month sentence, Det. Scott said police are trying to locate the cat's

owner in an effort to prove the animal was someone's property and thereby

solidify their case for a possible conviction on indictable mischief, which

carries a maximum sentence of two years.

 

Mr. Power has been released on bail but Mr. Wennekers remains in custody.

Zoe Stonyk, a volunteer at Art System who shared a number of classes with

Mr. Power, said his previous video work has often examined controversial

subjects.

 

She said one project, filmed while Mr. Power was employed at a poultry

processing plant, detailed chickens being slaughtered in an effort to

examine the reality of meat production.

 

Johanna Householder taught Mr. Power as an instructor in performance art and

contemporary issues at the art college. She described him as a student " who

looks deeply into very difficult questions. "

 

She also attended his bail hearing, out of concern for what she said was the

" inflammatory " nature of e-mails sent out by Ms. GordonMarsh calling for the

Art System boycott.

 

" It felt like a bit of witch hunt, " Ms. Householder said.

 

" Art System has done a good job of establishing itself as a venue appealing

to a new, less mainstream generation of artists and I'm concerned about the

cloud that is now hanging over it. "

 

Art System opened early last year. Its mandate is to maintain a lively

exhibit space " on the edge that fosters young ideas, " according to Ms.

Stonyk.

 

Mr. Brown, who is renowned for what Ms. Stonyk described as his " punk rock "

attitude toward art, was a natural choice to become director.

 

Ms. GordonMarsh's boycott has so far convinced organizers of one fundraiser

scheduled for Art System to cancel. She said she plans to continue the

boycott until Mr. Brown steps down as director.

 

Mr. Borins, however, condemned what he said is the " lynch mob mentality "

behind the Art System boycott.

 

" There's nothing wrong with attending the bail hearing of friend, " he said.

 

" They say we're guilty by association and that shows an astonishing level of

ignorance.

 

" We're against cruelty to animals, but these people want us to issue a

statement that would define the limits of artistic freedom, " he added. " It's

extortion. "

 

 

**********************************************************************

 

TORONTO STAR - Jul. 20, 2001

Gallery vandalized, threatened

Cat-torture video draws revulsion while pushing limits of artistic licence

by Daphne Gordon

 

A local art gallery has been the subject of vandalism and threats to its

employees after an artist loosely connected with it was charged with killing

a cat in the name of art.

 

``It was pretty disturbing to come in this morning and find the window

broken,'' Art System volunteer Jennifer Marman said yesterday.

 

Marman found a brick wrapped in newspaper on the floor, and the gallery's

voice-mail box contained threatening messages. One gave a graphic

description of how the employees should be scalped.

 

The gallery has reported the incidents to police, but no charges have been

laid.

 

``I don't even know what we've done wrong,'' said Art System co-director

Daniel Borins, explaining that the gallery has been targeted because he and

colleague Jubal Brown are friendly with Jesse Power, a 21-year-old art

student recently charged with cruelty to animals and mischief after police

confiscated a video he allegedly made, in which three men torture and kill a

cat.

 

A second individual, Anthony Ryan Wennekers, has also been charged, and a

third man remains at large.

 

Borins said he and Brown are personally disgusted by the idea of animal

torture, but added it isn't up to them to decide whether this is art or not.

 

``In the 20th century in artistic production, subjectivity has grown

stronger and stronger, to the point where artists don't need consensus to

declare that whatever they're doing is art,'' he explained.

 

Whether it's art or not is the age-old question when it comes to works that

involve animals or human beings under conditions of cruelty. But there is no

question in curator Marc Mayer's mind that this is clearly not art.

 

``First of all, these aren't really artists, they're art students,'' said

Mayer, director of the Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery. ``You wouldn't

call someone a doctor if they were in medical school.''

 

Mayer said cruelty to animals is not considered acceptable as an art

practice, and he could not think of any other examples of art shown in a

gallery that involved it.

 

``It's just juvenile. It doesn't even register on the art Richter scale.

It's a clear-cut case of illegal behaviour.''

 

(One of the few other instances of cruelty to a live animal in the name of

art also involved a student. British artist J.J. Charlesworth created a

video for his final graduation show at London's Goldsmith College of Art in

1996. His work, Goldfish In A Blender, got him into trouble with animal

rights activists, but he was never charged.)

 

University of Toronto art professor Elizabeth Legge agreed that calling

something art doesn't justify immoral behaviour, and she pointed out that

the cat torture is different from other works of art that have involved

animals.

 

She uses artist Damien Hirst as an example. His 1991 work The Physical

Impossibility Of Death in The Mind of Something Living was an installation

of a dead shark suspended in formaldehyde in a glass case. But he used a

shark that was already dead, Legge said.

 

Others of his works have involved cows, pigs and sheep, but they were

likewise corpses when he used them.

 

For Legge, it's also a question of how effective the cat video would be at

getting a point across.

 

``If it was meant to appall people about cruelty to animals, it's probably

failing in its attempt. They could have gone to a stockyard and that would

have been more effective.''

 

Some artists have injured themselves in the name of art. For example,

British artist Chris Burden had a friend shoot him in the arm in front of an

audience. But he was a willing victim, and that makes all the difference,

Legge says.

 

``If you torture an animal or someone who is in no position to resist, there

is a power relationship there that is very problematic. It's a huge moral

issue.''

 

Power, who attends the Ontario College of Art and Design, could not be

reached for comment yesterday. The video was never shown at Art System. Nor

was it ever stored there. The gallery has shown the artist's work twice in

the past, but the pieces didn't involve cruelty.

 

``We've never even seen the video, and we've made a public statement that we

don't condone this kind of thing,'' said Borins, adding that the gallery, on

Spadina Ave. near College St., was named in a recent e-mail campaign by

local artist Cathy GordonMarsh.

 

GordonMarsh sent the e-mail to her friends in the arts community, urging

them to boycott the gallery because Brown and Borins attended Power's bail

hearing May 30 to provide support to their friend and colleague.

 

``I wanted to stop people from going there, sure, and I wanted to raise

awareness that this is the kind of political attitude that is curating Art

System,'' GordonMarsh said. ``Someone had to say that this doesn't represent

the arts community.''

 

Borins said he thinks animal rights activists are unfairly using the gallery

to get their point across.

 

 

**********************************************************************

 

GLOBE AND MAIL - July 21, 2001 - R1

But is it art?

One man crucifies himself from a crane while a dead cow drops from

the air. Another stands accused of torturing a cat on video. A third

vomits over priceless paintings. KIM HONEY reports on the artists with

a mission to shock

By KIM HONEY

 

In Berlin, a headless, skinned cow carcass stuffed with fireworks

explodes on impact after it is dropped 90 metres from a helicopter

into an abandoned building. In Toronto, an art student is charged

with cruelty to animals after police seize a videotape that depicts the

torture and murder of a cat.

 

In Mexico, a U.S. artist buys a female cadaver and photographs

himself having sex with the corpse for an exhibit called Blind Date.

 

All three incidents have been met with varying degrees of disgust, a

collective outrage that fuels a greater debate about the merits of

provocative art.

 

In the Berlin performance, a 13-year-old animal lover argued in

court that she would suffer a " spiritual shock " if she saw artist

Wolfgang Flatz drop the dead cow from the sky. A court rejected

her plea to stop the event, saying she did not have to watch.

Thursday's event also featured the artist hanging, naked, from a

crane above the crowd while pulsing music, punctuated by a cow's

moos, played in the background. The cow was dropped from the

helicopter as Flatz dangled in the air.

 

As extreme art goes, this is just the tip of the iceberg. And at the

crux of the controversy is the question: What is the definition of art? And

who decides what is art in an age when torture, necrophilia, and

self-mutilation all pass for creative human endeavour? Is it up to the

individual who creates the piece to declare it as art, or should

society decide whether the work has any validity?

 

Contemporary art is particularly vulnerable to this criticism, having

moved away from oil-on-canvas renderings of bowls of fruit

displayed in heavy gilt frames toward monochromatic abstractions,

performance art, and even auditory forms such as Forty Part

Motet, the soundscape by Canadian Janet Cardiff that won a

$50,000 visual-arts award for an exhibition you couldn't see.

Remember Voice of Fire,the huge canvas purchased for $2-million

by the National Gallery in 1990? Even the chairman of the

government's culture committee couldn't grasp the importance of the

new acquisition.

 

" Two cans of paint and two rollers, " said the Manitoba farmer,

adding that he could do it in 10 minutes.

 

The Toronto case involving the art student and the cat has become a

flash point for the discussion, particularly since animal-rights activists

have targeted a student-run art gallery after its co-directors refused to

condemn the work of the student artist. On Thursday, someone tossed a brick

through the second-floor window of Art System, a gallery supported by the

student union at the Ontario College of Art and Design (OCAD). The gallery

has also received several death threats on its voice mail.

 

Jessie Powers, a 21-year-old OCAD student, and another man,

Anthony Ryan Wenneker, 24, were charged on May 30 with cruelty

to animals and mischief after police raided a downtown apartment

and confiscated videotapes, a headless, skinned cat from the fridge,

as well as a rodent's skeleton and several animal skulls. Powers is

out on bail while Wenneker is still in custody. Police have said one

video featured the prolonged torture of a cat.

 

The art student, who took two classes taught by performance artist

Johanna Householder, is a " sensitive, thoughtful young man who

thinks deeply about questions of life and death, " the OCAD teacher

said. " My understanding is that he is extremely concerned about the

wholesale slaughter of animals for food and other purposes. "

 

In an interview with a Toronto paper shortly after the police raid on

his apartment, Powers explained that, as an artist, he was committed

to exposing the cruelty to animals butchered for food.

 

(A request to speak to Powers this week was turned down by his

defence lawyer, Andrea Tuck-Jackson, who also declined to

comment on the case while it is still before the courts.)

 

Powers had never shown any of his animal-related work in or

outside of the classroom before, although some of his previous work

was shown at Art System. Daniel Borins, co-director of the gallery,

said the student was known for his " fantastic Utopian drawings of

self-sufficient farms he would like to live on. "

 

So after Powers was arrested, Householder, Borins and the other

Art System co-director, Jubal Brown, attended the bail hearing to

show moral support.

 

Householder explained why: " I had just thought, 'This is not right.

This is a guilty-until-proven-innocent kind of situation. I'm going to

go and show my support for him. I don't want him to feel victimized

by animal-rights people.' "

 

Brown and Borins seemed to strike a nerve when they wouldn't

condemn Powers's work, antagonizing animal-rights activists who

were shocked that the avant-garde gallery's representatives didn't

move swiftly to denounce the young artist, even if Powers was their

personal friend. They do, however, condemn the torture of a cat, as

Brown told a local reporter earlier in the week. " I don't support the

killing of animals for food or art, " said Brown, a vegetarian who

owns two cats. " But whether it is art is not for us to answer. "

 

Brown was at the centre of a similar firestorm five years ago when,

as an OCAD student, he decided to show his disdain for " stale,

obedient, lifeless crusts " of art work by vomiting primary colours on

art work that he considered so bourgeois that it made him physically

ill.

 

He managed to regurgitate red on a Dufy at the Art Gallery of

Ontario and blue on a Mondrian at the Metropolitan Museum of Art

in New York before he abandoned his project. For his efforts, he

was banned for life from the AGO.

 

Brown is keeping a low profile these days, but gallery co-director

Borins stepped in to try and explain why they both feel it is unfair for

them to judge Powers's video.

 

" As curators and programmers, Jubal and I feel that it is a very

difficult situation to put us in . . . and that is to define the boundaries

of artistic practice, " Borins said. " Because those will be broken

instantaneously, and it reduces the language of art to only a game in which

boundaries are broken. "

 

The young curators are loath to make a pronouncement on what is

art or what isn't art, because they feel it should be up to society to

decide, said Householder.

 

" I kind of feel like we've been down this road so many times before

-- elephant dung, naked people, vomit, " she said, referring to recent

controversial North American artworks. Good art, the OCAD

instructor said, is something we, as a society, decide upon after

reflection and consideration.

 

Christina Ritchie, director/curator of the Contemporary Art Gallery

in Vancouver, said society has to try and make a distinction between

art and spectacle. It's one thing for an artist to make a statement with his

or her work, but it's completely another thing if the sole intent is to

attract attention.

 

" We want to give attention to things that are meaningful, relevant,

and have some sort of relevance within our social repertoire, " she

said.

 

Part of the artist's job is to find an appropriate way to express

himself in order to engage society in discourse about a subject the

artist feels is compelling. " I think it's a two-way street, " said Ritchie.

" Art is not simply an act of declaration. "

 

Cathy GordonMarsh is the woman who has waged a battle to

boycott Art System because she feels the OCAD gallery directors,

as representatives of a cutting-edge gallery, should take a stand on

the video. Although she is not a member of any animal-rights group,

she called the case " terrifying. "

 

" [Jubal Brown] is condoning this as an artistic process by not

condemning it. He is allowing the possibility that this could be art, "

GordonMarsh said. " Like, 'Who are we to judge this?' That just

completely flipped me right out. "

 

As for the video, GordonMarsh said she feels " very strongly " that

" this is not art or an artistic process that I would accept. " She has no

problem passing judgment, and she is encouraging groups to boycott

the gallery until the directors say what she wants them to say: Jessie

Powers's video is not art.

 

Borins argued that the language of artistic production is far more

sophisticated than the language of law, with the result that they will

always be at odds with each other.

 

GordonMarsh, on the other hand, said she has no problem defining

the boundaries of art, and noted that there is already a boundary for

this kind of art -- the law.

 

" Like what? We're going to change the laws for artists just so they

can abuse animals for the sake of a greater point? There are other

ways of communicating a message about that topic that doesn't

involve the direct torture of an animal. "

 

Powers's case is reminiscent of the case of Sniffy the rat, a rodent

destined to become snake fodder until it was purchased by Vancouver artist

Rick Gibson in 1990.

 

Animal-rights activists were up in arms over Gibson's plan to crush

Sniffy between two canvases using a 25-kilogram concrete block,

but the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals was

powerless to stop the performance because lawyers deemed that it

was a humane way for Sniffy to die and the rat would not suffer.

 

When Gibson showed up for the alleged performance and told the

crowd it was cancelled, an angry mob chased him anyway. He later

said he had no intention of crushing Sniffy. Powers's idea might have

been valid, Householder said, but whatever his artistic intent, the

way it was expressed was way off the mark.

 

" If Jessie is saying that this is to bring attention to the cruelty and

suffering of animals that are used for meat, that seems to me to be a fairly

reasonable thing to say, " she added. " Also, it does open it up to some

debate. What's the difference between a cat being killed and eaten in a

video to a cow being killed and eaten in a video? "

 

According to Borins, Powers has the right to say whatever he wants

to say, even though he might not get artistic attention for it.

 

" That's what you might have to face as an artist. There might be a

curator or a program that intervenes and says, 'This isn't such a great

piece, this isn't such a great idea.' And that's why, if you're an artist,

you should want an audience. "

 

 

**********************************************************************

 

TORONTO STAR - Jul. 21, 2001

Guard at art gallery after link to torture video

Jonathan Bjerg Moller

STAFF REPORTER

 

A security guard was posted last night outside a downtown art gallery after

it was reported to be loosely linked to a controversial video of cat

torture.

 

Yesterday, the gallery's landlord posted signs saying it was closed, and a

man was arrested and charged with mischief after a protester barged into the

gallery. Cat feces was also found at the entrance.

 

Jubal Brown, a co-director of Art System, said staff at the gallery, which

is run by the Ontario College of Art and Design's student union, would not

be intimidated by protesters.

 

Brown said Art System would remain open, despite the landlord's signs

indicating the gallery was closed.

 

``He was a little upset,'' Brown said of the landlord. ``He was concerned

he'd get bricks thrown through his window.''

 

The gallery says the video that depicts the torture and death of a cat was

never shown at the gallery, nor was it ever stored there. It claims animal

activists have targeted Art System because some of its staff are friendly

with Jesse Power, an art student charged with cruelty to animals and

mischief after police confiscated a video he allegedly made in which three

men torture and kill a cat.

 

 

With files from Daphne Gordon

 

 

**********************************************************************

 

ANIMAL ABUSE; NEW PENALTIES FOR CRUELTY ARE DECADES OVERDUE

The Toronto Sun - Fri 20 Jul 2001

Editorial/Opinion

BY PETER WORTHINGTON

 

Last year, the Toronto Humane Society received 1,308 complaints of cruelty

or abuse to animals (as reported to the governing Ontario Humane Society),

yet its six inspectors didn't lay one criminal charge.

 

In all Ontario in 2000, there were 97 criminal charges laid for cruelty to

animals, with a conviction rate of 86% - a pretty good prosecution ratio

that is diminished when one realizes that last year there were over 16,000

cruelty complaints.

 

Not only are successful prosecutions difficult - they're almost pointless,

so lenient are the sentences. Animal cruelty laws have not been amended in

Ontario since the 1890s, when they mostly applied to how cattle were killed

or horses cared for. Dogs and cats were - and still are under the law -

regarded as " property " to which you can do practically anything, as if they

were TV sets.

 

Animal cruelty laws scream for updating and revising. But farmers,

researchers and anglers and hunters worry that toughening up

cruelty laws may make them vulnerable - not from government, but animal

nutbars who might argue that putting a worm on a hook (or catching a fish

with a hook through its lip) constitutes cruelty - which it may well be.

 

Those involved in animal research are especially uneasy that new cruelty

laws might be turned on them.

 

Regardless, new penalties for cruelty are decades overdue.

 

Consider the case of a Toronto cat skinned alive on video, and two men

charged with torturing animals. Jessie Powers, 21, and Anthony Wenneker, 24,

were charged after police seized 70 " sickening " videotapes of cruelty to

various animals, including an orangutan, fox, pig and that cat being skinned

alive.

 

Under the Criminal Code, the maximum sentence is a $2,000 fine, or six

months in jail and a two-year ban on owning an animal - ludicrous for such

sadistic depravity.

 

In the last Sunday Sun, Michele Mandel highlighted how much more enlightened

American justice is for animals: Andrew Burnett was sentenced to three years

in prison for killing a woman's Bichon Frise by hurling it into ongoing

traffic on a California Highway. (A Thornhill guy who angrily flung a

neighbour's toy poodle to the pavement last fall, permanently damaging

it,got a $750 fine.)

 

Anger aside, there's something terribly wrong with people who get their

kicks from torture or cruelty - be it to humans or animals. Personally, I

don't draw a distinction.

 

Cruelty to animals is an area too long ignored. Criminologists and

behavioral scientists have established links between torture and crime -

that torturing animals can be a sign of future aberrant criminal behaviour.

Many serial killers have a common history of cruelty to animals as children.

The connection is imprecise and ill-defined, but it's there.

 

Cruelty and/or torture have little to do with killing. They have everything

to do with behaviour, attitude, sadism. Basically, a quick death is a

merciful death; a slow death, tortuous.

 

A case can be made that torture or cruelty is the most repugnant human

behaviour. It is, or can be, worse than murder.

 

Due to research at the FBI's Behavioral Science headquarters at Quantico,

Va., and elsewhere, we are learning deviant criminal behaviour in adults

often seems to have its genesis in youthful behaviour that manifests itself

in cruelty to animals and people.

 

It would be of undeniable benefit to be able to predict, or anticipate,

criminal behaviour before it happens.

 

Just as records should be kept of pedophiles, rapists and spousal abusers,

so should records be kept of those who torture animals. I'd argue that

someone who can torture an animal is also someone able to torture a human -

the same emotional or psychological satisfaction is involved.

 

I'd like to see the law not distinguish between torturing a human or an

animal. Those who torture may need psychiatric help - and animal torturers

should get mandatory psychological assessments.

 

Others who commit blatant acts of cruelty should go to prison for years,

depending on the degree of their crime. Anyone guilty of torturing an animal

should be barred, for life, from ever owning an animal as a " pet, " just as

pedophiles should be prevented from ever again associating with children.

 

As well, I think the media should publicize all animal cruelty cases,

running photos of those convicted - and photos of the animal(s) they abused,

no matter how horrific.

 

If courts are too lenient, resort to public disapproval. This has nothing to

do with animal " rights, " but everything to do with being civilized and

decent.

 

 

 

 

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