Censorship
About
Artworks that take censorship—the act of prohibiting something from being read, heard, or seen—as their subject matter. Throughout history, governments, leaders, and communities have censored art and culture as a means of control, often targeting religious icons, political subject matter, or the human form, especially nudity. Not surprisingly, many artists directly address issues of censorship in their work. For example, Jenny Holzer created a series of paintings that document redacted government materials. Dissident Chinese artist Ai Weiwei has exposed the Chinese government’s campaign of misinformation and massive cover-up of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake with his work Straight, for which he painstakingly straightened 150 steel rods salvaged from the ruins of a school that collapsed during the national tragedy.
