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Woman Arrested For Destroying Offensive Jesus Depiction In Museum Display

By Howard M. Friedman

As reported by Fox News, since Sept. 11, the Loveland, Colorado Museum Gallery, a tax funded museum, has hosted a show titled "The Legend of Bud Shark & His Indelible Ink." It is a display of 82 prints by ten artists who have worked with Colorado printer Bud Shark. One of the prints is a 12-panel lithograph by Stanford University Professor Enrique Chagoya called "The Misadventures of Romantic Cannibals."  Huffington Post has a photo of all the panels in its report on the show. While the show spent four months at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Denver without incident, in Loveland it has triggered protests as a Loveland City Council member and the media say that one of Chagoya' panels depicts Jesus having oral sex. However City Council voted 6-3 not to take up complaints about the exhibit.  According to AP, on Wednesday, a 56-year old Montana woman, Kathleen Folden,who is a long-haul trucker, drove to Loveland and using a crowbar, broke the plexiglass case housing the panels and ripped up the offending panel.  Here is a photo of the print after the attack. Police arrested Folden and charged her with felony criminal mischief. CNN reports today that Folden will plead not guilty, arguing that the print was not worth $1000, the threshold for bringing the charges as a felony. Folden's attorney said: "The real issue is the city of Loveland, which is not supposed to be endorsing or belittling religion. They specifically endorsed a piece that belittled Jesus Christ."

Full post as published by Religion Clause on October 09, 2010 (boomark / email).