Artist in Residence International Exhibition at the Atlanta Chamber Of Commerce

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Date: 1994

Region: North America

Subject: Explicit Sexuality, Political/Economic/Social Opinion

Medium: Mixed Media, Sculpture, Installation


Artist: Evan Levy

Confronting Bodies: Atlanta Chamber of Commerce

Dates of Action: 1994

Location: Atlanta, Georgia

Description of Artwork: The piece, Power Boxes consisted of several mixed media sculptures using children's toys and other found objects installed within circuit breaker boxes. One box had letter blocks spelling the word "KING" and had a large muscular male doll wearing a Coca-Cola label and holding a syringe.

The Incident: Evan Levy was involved in a program called Artist in Residence International, an artist exchange program. Artist in Residence arranged to display some of their artist's work in the Atlanta Chamber Of Commerce's new hallway gallery. Levy's work was chosen and installed, however afterwards was questioned for it's appropriateness by the Director of Cultural Affairs for the Atlanta Chamber of Commerce, Beverly Losman, who had viewed slides of Levy's work prior to its installation. At night, Losman returned and removed two of Levy's works, claiming that they were not the ones that she had viewed.

Results of Incident: Losman's supervisor, Susan Neugent, ordered the entire exhibit removed.

Source: Artistic Freedom Under Attack, 1995