Daily Sitka Sentinel

Art in Beholders’ Eyes? Not at Sitka City Hall

By ABIGAIL BLISS
Sentinel Staff Writer
    A controversial collection of art was removed from the Stortz Gallery on the second floor of City Hall Thursday after a public outcry, City Administrator Keith Brady told the Sentinel.
    The collection of some 15 acrylic paintings by Sitka artist D. Bennion and curated by Norman Campbell was put up Sunday in preparation for today’s Greater Sitka Arts Council’s Art Walk. The title of the exhibition was “Editorial Illustrations,” and it was expected to run through the end of April.

Empty display cases are pictured at City Hall today, after artwork was removed Thursday. (Sentinel Photo)

    “We had complaints from citizens, and it just became too much of a distraction for staff,” he said.
    Bennion told the Sentinel he saw things in a different light.
    “It didn’t fit with the politics of the city administrator,” he said. “He completely violated my first amendment rights to freedom of speech, and there was no due process.
    “It’s like getting kicked in the face,” he said.
    Bennion said no one from the City had informed him that the show would be cut short. He said he was in his shop making a sandwich board for the sidewalk to advertise his show during today’s Art Walk when Campbell called with the “bad news.”
    “All my work was stuffed in the broom closet,” the artist said. “Luckily, none of it was damaged.”

    Bennion said he has been involved in “numerous solo and group shows” in Sitka over the past fifteen years, and had never had trouble with any of them. He said he was not anticipating the backlash to “Editorial Illustrations,” which he said provided social-political commentary on events from 2003 to present day.
    “I’m a taxpayer, and I pay for the lights and the electricity in City Hall,” the artist said. “That’s a public space.”
    He said he also spoke with one Assembly member who was “completely offended” but unable to provide Bennion with “a good reason” as to why.
    A photo of one painting was posted to the Facebook group “Sitka Chatters” Thursday, and by 2 p.m. today had generated some 40 comments, many negative, objecting to the political commentary in the colorful image.
    Assembly member Richard Wein said he had seen the show during a trip to city hall Wednesday and received notification Thursday of the removal of the art.
    “To me, whether I agree with it or not, I love our first amendment,” he said. “The artwork was very nice ... It’s somebody’s opinion, but expressed in art.”
    Assembly member Kevin Knox said he, too, had been alerted to the show’s removal Thursday. He said he found it “troubling” for the City to be in “this position of seemingly censoring freedom of expression.”
    Brady said he and Campbell were to have worked collaboratively to showcase art at City Hall, and, on Thursday, expressed hope that they would be able to agree on new pieces for display before this evening’s Art Walk.
    Campbell said that until the Sentinel called him Thursday he had not been informed of the collection’s removal.
    “Nobody has called me at all,” he said. “I’m totally unaware of this.”
    By this afternoon, Campbell and Brady had not been able to find an artist able to fill the empty gallery on such short notice, and the City had been “cut out of” the Art Walk, Brady said.
    Bennion said he would try to showcase the work included in “Editorial Illustrations” at another Sitka venue in May.
    “There’s nothing obscene in the work,” he said. “(I’m) going to try to get it in another spot that the City doesn’t have toehold in.”
    He did not disclose any additional steps he planned to take at this time.
    “You kind of have to be careful of what you do in this town,” he said. “You can’t beat city hall.”
    The second floor lobby at city hall was dedicated as an art exhibition space in memory of city building official William Stortz, who was killed in the 2015 landslide on Kramer Avenue.