Art Review ‘Paints Inaccurate Portrait’

This letter is offered as a rebuttal to Cathy Curtis’ opinions (“Unfocused Show Reflects Weak Curatorial Stance”) that rambled across the pages of the Calendar section on April 30. She painted an inaccurate portrait of Norman Lloyd as an indecisive curator whose last show is “wishy-washy.”

Removal of a John Lennon photo started the fuss (at the Muckenthaler Cultural Center in Fullerton), but the real issue is much deeper than that. It involves, as Curtis points out, the relationship between trustees and curators in any cultural establishment. She faults Lloyd for not confronting the trustees head-on and refusing to allow them to veto works from the show. Easy for her to say, easy to place the blame after the dust settles. Lloyd chose to temper action with thought. Personally, I prefer his contemplative action to the hysterics that Curtis seems to prefer.

Curtis failed to mention that, although the photo of Lennon is back now, many other works in the exhibit had been removed by the time she was able to see it, and I wonder how she can possibly offer an objective opinion having seen only part of the show.

Also, the title of the show--”Heroes, Heroines, Idols and Icons”--is ambiguous enough to allow a diverse grouping of dissimilar work to function, without the one-liner didacticism for which Curtis has demonstrated a preference since her opinions became public a few years ago. The fact is--yep!--Ma and Pa, Mickey Mouse, workin’ guys and even you an’ me could be heroes to somebody, and the Coca-Cola bottle cap might be as much of a cultural icon as the Statue of Liberty. It seems to me that leaving some things to the viewer is actually a good curatorial practice.

This has certainly been a trying period for the arts, with public censorship and questions of what the responsibilities of our cultural institutions are. But there really is nothing new in all of this in a vital, changing, free society. The real tragedy is the loss of Norman Lloyd as the curator of the Muckenthaler Cultural Center. The community will miss the type of quality exhibitions that he brought to the area.

STEVE METZGER, Fullerton