Shades of Whitewashing
The unique power of public art stems
from its very nature: creative expression
paid for by the people to be viewed not
by a limited few in a sterile museum room
but by anyone in a public space in the real
world. Public art can beautify, decorate,
or bring sunshine to a dreary day. It can
also spark new ideas, generate passionate
debate, and force us to consider the world
from a perspective other than our own.
The insightful article “Don’t Look
Now!” by Robin D.G. Kelley [Sept. 23]
demonstrated this power of public art by
illuminating a host of ways the 13 New
Deal–funded frescoes by Victor Arnautoff
at George Washington High School in
San Francisco have brought complex con-
versations about representation, history,
and artistic freedom to life in 2019.
On August 13, the school board re-
versed its previous decision to paint over
and destroy the murals. But it voted instead
to “remove the murals from public view”
by boarding them over with “solid panels”
or “equivalent material.” While not as
irreversible as destroying the murals, this
equally bad decision was a compromise with
nobody and accepted by no one. As the ac-
tor and activist Danny Glover, an alumnus
of the high school, said, “To destroy them[email protected]“... visits not just the world of
poetry, but the American West–
especially his beloved desert–plus
Ireland, Spain, Africa, and Mexico,
as well. He writes of all of these
worlds and the people in them
with love and intensity...”
—John H. Irsfeld, author of Rat’s AlleyReading the West Award
Nonfiction Winner
“Throughout this well-crafted,
contemplative collection,
Corbett writes eloquently
about the environmental
conundrums she faces...”
—Foreword Reviews“Nature-loving readers will
find value in his [Pearson’s]
insights both into a specific
conservation milestone
and into the broader sweep
of the environmentalist
movement’s history.”
—Publishers WeeklyBooks That Matter
unpress.nevada.edu
Inspiring Change in our World
or block them from view would be akin to
book burning. We would be missing the
opportunity for enhanced historic intro-
spection this moment has provided us.”
The Coalition to Protect Public Art is
pursuing a variety of political, legislative,
and legal options to ensure that this valu-
able public art remains public.
The poet Bertolt Brecht said, “Art is
not a mirror with which to reflect reality
but a hammer with which to shape it.”
Rather than destroy or hide art we don’t
like, let’s fund new public art and create
more hammers to shape a better world.
Jon Golinger
Executive Director
Coalition to Protect Public Art
san francisco
I appreciate Jon Golinger’s letter and his ef-
forts to ensure that future generations might
one day see Victor Arnautoff’s mural in per-
son rather than as a virtual image. However,
the final agreement clearly states that the
frescoes will be covered and not destroyed.
Presumably, whatever material will be used
to shroud them can be removed, even if it
requires great effort. I agree that the school
board is intent on permanently hiding the
work from view, but school boards come
and go, and in light of the current political
situation, this decision is far more reason-
able than sandblasting or whitewashing.
The more urgent question remains,
“What is the fate of schools like George
Washington High in a city experiencing
such aggressive gentrification and privat-
ization?” I hope Golinger and others agree
that the struggle against whitewashing his-
tory should extend to the whitewashing of
the city itself. The dispossession and settle-
ment depicted in Arnautoff’s Life of Wash-
ington is hardly ancient history; it speaks to
the present and possibly the future, unless
we stop it. Robin D.G. Kelley
los angeles2 The Nation. October 28/November 4, 2019