M.F. Husein
Despite the rattled global economy, art fairs have been going off without a hitch throughout the year. Despite many failing fairs, and low sales, there hasn’t been a whole lot of, well, drama (or scandal) this year in the international art fair world. However, India Art Summit has made the headlines by not allowing the work of the “Indian Picasso”, M.F. Hussain, to be showed at this year’s fair.
Hussain’s work has angered many Hindus in India, as his paintings are infamous for portraying Hindu goddesses in the nude. In order to protect the fair from violent protesters, organizers decided to ban Hussain’s work. While some are upset and claming censorship, it poses an excellent question… should art fairs have the right to ban work by certain artists? Legally, of course they can, since almost all fairs are privately owned and operated. In this case, safety is the highest concern, but are the organizers making a huge mistake by excluding such an important artist?
