Artists Halt Corcoran Exhibits in Wake of Show’s Cancellation

A boycott by some artists of the Corcoran Gallery over its cancellation of a photography exhibit including pictures of genitalia has led to the “indefinite postponement” of two other scheduled contemporary art exhibits, gallery officials said today.

The scheduling in June of the exhibit by Robert Mapplethorpe touched off a political controversy that resulted in Congress moving to restrict federal subsidies for artists.

The gallery said today that contemporary artist Annette Lemieux has pulled what it described as her “first major one-person museum exhibition” scheduled to run from Oct. 28 to Dec. 31. and that six sculptors also have canceled a show of their work scheduled to run from Feb. 3 to April 8.

Deborah Shriver, a spokeswoman for the Corcoran, acknowledged that 10 American painters, including Lemieux, featured in a joint U.S.-Soviet exhibition to be presented next spring have also threatened to deny the gallery the right to display their work.

The House voted this summer to cut the National Endowment of the Arts’ budget by $45,000--the total of federal grants received by Mapplethorpe and Andres Serrano, a photographer whose picture of a crucifix in a jar of urine also touched off a protest.

And the Senate last month approved legislation by Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.) that would prohibit federal financing of sexually explicit artwork.