Lynn Zachreson, painter
Date: 1999
Region: North America
Subject: Explicit Sexuality Nudity
Medium: Painting
Artist: Lynn Zachreson
Confronting Bodies: Raymond Evans, in charge of exhibitions at the Louden Nelson Community Center
Date of Action: November 17, 1999
Location: Louden Nelson Community Center, Santa Cruz, California, USA
Description of Artwork: Paintings of nude figures. The nine controversial works were all water colors of women. (The painting to the right was not one of them, but shows her artistic style.) Eight of the paintings are works from two models: a 78-year-old woman and another a woman in her ninth month of pregnancy. In the ninth painting, a third woman strikes a pose looking over her shoulder with her back to the viewer. There was no objection to a painting of a naked man, genitalia in full view.
The Incident: The artist installed the exhibition of her work and the work of two of her students in the community center's hallway gallery. Two days later, the director in charge of the show, Raymond Evans, demanded that the nine paintings be taken down because they were too "suggestive."
Results of Incident: Zachreson seized the opportunity to spoof censorship and promote discussion by covering the breasts and pubic areas of the watercolor representations of women with Islamic Purdah fashioned from rice paper. Another figure was covered in paper doll clothes. The paintings were exhibited in their original state at the University of California at Santa Cruz in January 2000.
Source: NCAC, MetroActive News and Issues-- From the January 5-12, 2000 issue of Metro Santa Cruz