Art lovers looking forward to viewing paintings by Turner and Reynolds at an exhibition have been told they could be upset by racist imagery – after the Royal Academy slapped a trigger warning on it.
Woke curators are notifying visitors to Entangled Pasts, 1768-now: Art, Colonialism and Change that it ‘will contain themes of slavery and racism, and historical racial language and imagery’.
Lubaina Himid, a contemporary artist whose work is also featured, said some of the paintings were ‘difficult’. But she also said the show was a ‘huge, rich, layered filling in of gaps’ in how black people had contributed to Britain.
The trigger warning appears on the exhibition webpage, and will be displayed at the show, which runs from February 3, with entry costing up to £22.
The gallery says the exhibition was ‘informed by our ongoing research of the RA and its colonial past’. It explains: ‘This exhibition engages around 50 artists connected to the RA to explore themes of migration, exchange, artistic traditions, identity and belonging.’
The warning is understood to relate to an 1853 sculpture by John Bell of a chained woman entitled The American Slave; a 1998 tableau by Betye Saar, I’ll Bend But I Will Not Break, which includes a diagram of conditions on a slave ship; a 2015 video installation by John Akomfrah named Vertigo Sea which features a dramatisation of slaves in a ship; and a 1997 work entitled Freedom, A Fable, by US artist Kara Walker, which includes racist terminology.
Based in Burlington House, Piccadilly, the Royal Academy of Arts was founded by a personal act of George III in 1768. Its first president was Sir Joshua Reynolds, whose 1770 work Portrait Of A Man appears in the exhibition. There are 80 Royal Academicians, including David Hockney and Tracey Emin.
The Royal Academy says of the exhibition: ‘J.M.W. Turner and Ellen Gallagher. Joshua Reynolds and Yinka Shonibare. John Singleton Copley and Hew Locke. Past and present collide in one powerful exhibition.
‘This spring, we bring together over 100 major contemporary and historic works as part of a conversation about art and its role in shaping narratives of empire, enslavement, resistance, abolition and colonialism – and how it may help set a course for the future.’
A spokesman added: ‘Content guidance is often deemed necessary, so that visitors can feel fully informed before seeing the exhibition.’
It is not the first time a gallery has warned visitors they may be offended. Last year, Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum in Glasgow issued a ‘content warning’ at an exhibition highlighting the city’s ties to slavery. It stated: ‘Some objects contain racist language and images which may cause discomfort and pain.’
Last November, a bizarre warning was issued for the play Jeffrey Bernard Is Unwell about one of Britain’s most notorious drunkards, with audiences being cautioned that it contained references to alcohol. The production is being staged inside The Coach & Horses in Soho, the London pub where the late writer and raconteur was often seen propping up the bar.
This month, Tate Modern in London warned visitors about violence in a puppet film depicting scenes from the Crusades, and the British Film Institute left 007 fans shaken and stirred after placing trigger warnings on screenings of old James Bond movies, saying they would ’cause offence today’.
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Richard Eden
