Hovey and Orozco - "offensive" art?

Two conversations this week, discussing two sets of campus murals, have brought me to a question:

Just what is the place of offensive art on campus?

On one hand, Dartmouth has the Orozco murals (24 fresco panels, in fact) in Baker Library's Reserve Corridor. These came up in a class last week, where the discussion focused on whether or not the piece's message is diluted by its presence on a (mostly) liberal college campus far from the minds of those who might benefit from its admonishments. Most students probably don't find these murals offensive, but at the time of their completion in 1934, they were intended to create a stir, as this quote from the companion booklet shows: "Passive acceptance has no legitimate place in the educational process, and the double-edged incisiveness of controversy is one of the major educational values to be derived from work as positive and vital as Orozco's." Today we see them as a powerful cultural critique and pictorial history of the Americas. Yes, he was a Communist; yes, the piece is an attack on ideologies many hold sacred, including religion and war. But do the murals regularly inspire dialogue among students? The community? The nation? Perhaps they did fifty years ago, but you'd think they were invisible for the notice students give them on a daily basis.

On the very same day as this class discussion, another friend brought up another controversial set of Dartmouth murals and some students' plans to have them unveiled for discussion. In the basement of Thayer dining hall, lost from the institutional memory of most of the current student body, a different set of murals molders behind the walls of that game room you've likely never visited. Painted by Walter Humphries '14 in the late 1930's, the Hovey murals are a pictorial representation of the song "Eleazar Wheelock," which was written by Richard Hovey 1885 (also the composer of the original version of Dartmouth's Alma Mater).

The song begins with:

"Oh, Eleazar Wheelock was a very pious man;
He went into the wildernes to teach the Indian,
With a Gradus ad Parnassum, a Bible and a drum,
And five hundred gallons of New England rum.
Fill the bowl up! Fill the bowl up!"

I will note that I have not seen the actual murals - apparently, one can request special permission to view them, but I have not done so. From campus publication archives, one can gather that the pieces are done in a gaudy "pub style" and depict a rotund Wheelock surrounded by intoxicated Native Americans; the Review has described the scenes depicted in the murals as "whimsical and comic", the Free Press, "racist" and "insulting". Humphries painted the Hovey murals as a direct response to the Orozco murals, and, if various Free Press and Review articles are correct, he had prior campaigned for the removal of the Orozco art from Dartmouth. The Hovey murals have been covered since the 1970's. Why? Some members of the Dartmouth community (most notably, and understandably, the Native American community) found them offensive.

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I find it pretty fascinating that the Orozco murals have become less controversial over the years as the Hovey murals have become more so. So what's the distinction here? Why is one piece given prominent display in the Reserve Corridor and one piece hidden away?

Part of this comes back to what I mentioned at the start - a (mostly) liberal college campus is the very place where Orozco's ideals are debated, discussed, and handled safely with academic gloves. We can separate ourselves emotionally from what his murals stand for. The Hovey murals are harder to deal with; it's hard not to read their message as simply the dated, racist humor of a time long past. They aren't speaking to any great ideals, however misguided, they're just making a joke.

There are other reasons too. I might get into those later. But mostly right now I'm thinking of the question I've been trying to answer lately:

In light of their controversial subject matter, should the Hovey murals be covered?

The short answer is sort of.

The long answer is that the Hovey murals do serve a purpose at Dartmouth, but that purpose is not to be boldly displayed at all times in a public space. There is absolutely a distinction between the Hovey murals and the Orozco murals, just as there is a distinction between mediocre art and great art, or between thought-provoking controversy and crass offensiveness. It's fine if your distinction between the two is qualitatively different than mine. But at Dartmouth, in a public space such as the Reserves or the Hovey game room, we are obligated to respect the opinions of the Dartmouth community. So why not open this up to a campus discussion? I'll say that the Hovey pieces should be archived - if not in their actuality (removing murals is tremendously difficult), in digital form - for everyone to see and to discuss. Hiding them in their current fashion reflects the implication that Dartmouth wishes to hide its past, not learn from it. That said, if the piece is as blatantly racist as has been claimed, its role is not as public art - its role is as learning art in Rauner or the Hood, as part of the rest of the history of Dartmouth and a recognition that controversy does indeed serve a purpose at this College, even that which does not fit neatly into any convenient ideas of what is appropriate or artistic.