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(c)copyright
Monika
Steinhoff
"Opinion" The New Mexican December 3, 1999 ( William W. Waters)
A furor has erupted over an
art display at the Santa Fe Community College. Our town's commotion hasn't
reached the proportions of the one at the Brooklyn Museum of Art in New
York, but it brings up the same issues of freedom of expression, tolerance
and moral standards.
The painting in question, donated
by artist Monika Steinhoff to the college, is scheduled for removal from
public display, but will be available for view in a controlled-access location
at the college.
Titled And God Gave Dominion,
the painting shows an eroded landscape littered with tree stumps, a gorilla
on a cross and two bathing-suit clad female figures, one walking on a kind
of tight rope and another in a cage-like enclosure.
The work seems a simple allegory
of the environmental movement, how man's deforestation of the planet is
killing wildlife.
Now the college has decided
to remove the art from public display.