April 14, 2008 - 8:17 pm

Is this art?

Dori writes...

PI art critic Regina Hackett's blog tipped me off to this story. A Costa Rican artist - Guilermo Vargas Habacuc - has generated international outrage with this work of "art".

He took a starving dog off the streets of San Jose, Costa Rica and tied it up in an art gallery. Food was placed where the dog could smell it - but the poor creature could not reach the food. The dog starving to death was Habacuc's work of art.

You want an example of the slippery slope of an art world where anything goes? This is just an extension of the moral depravity of artists like Robert Mapplethorpe with his bullwhip in the anus... of Andrew Serrano with "Piss Christ"... when you have acceptance of works like those, it is not a tremendous moral leap to starving a dog. It's all a matter of degree.

The artist in this case says he wanted to generate conversation about the plight of thousands of dogs that are roaming the streets, starving to death every day in his city. He has indeed generated conversation.