Thursday, August 28, 2008 - 19:00
AFP News Briefs ListCrucified frog upsets devout Italians: culture minister
The religious feelings of devout Italians are being hurt by a deceased German artist's representation of a crucified frog, Culture Minister Sandro Bondi said Thursday.
Martin Kippenberger's sculpture -- which depicts a green frog on a cross, gripping a beer on one side and an egg on the other -- is on show at the modern art museum in the northern city of Bolzano.
In a statement Thursday, Bondi said the piece "hurts the religious sentiments of many people who see in the cross a symbol of the love of God," as he lashed out at publicly-funded venues that engage in "useless provocations".
Under pressure from local politicians, museum officials recently decided to move the sculpture from the entrance to the third floor -- but they are refusing to remove it from view altogether.
Curators say the sculpture -- part of a thematic exhibition that runs until September 21 -- is a self-portrait of the artist "in a profound state of crisis," but regional governor Luis Durnwalder has condemned it as a provocation in an area that is overwhelmingly Roman Catholic.
Kippenberg, a native of Dortmund who worked in Hamburg, Berlin, Paris and Cologne, died in Vienna in 1997 aged 44. He was a painter, sculptor and photographer, and some of his work is at the Saatchi gallery in London.
Images
A visitor walks past an untitled work created 1991 by Martin Kippenberger. The religious feelings of devout Italians are being hurt by the deceased German artist's representation of a crucified frog, Culture Minister Sandro Bondi said Thursday.
© 2007 AFP
