M.ANNENBERG

One-person exhibit, entitled, News/ Not News, April 28 - June 18, 2010 at Boricua College, New York, New York.

Bunnatine “Bunny” Greenhouse spoke on “Ethics and the Whistleblower” in conjunction with artist Marcia Annenberg’s lecture and exhibition “News/Not News” at Boricua College in New York City on May 19, 2010.

Photographs of the exhibition

text from video

Thank you to Jose Hernandez for giving me the opportunity to exhibit in this beautiful space. He’s recovering from surgery today and I wish him well.
Thank you to family, friends and faculty for coming to support the exhibit.
Thank you to my honored guest, Bunnatine Greenhouse, a woman I’ve looked up to for many years, who is a genuine American hero, who put her country first and her own self-interest second. A woman who had the inner strength to stand up to Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld when asked to do something unethical. Bunny, I don’t know where you got your courage from. I’m thrilled that you are here. When we get to her portrait across the room, she will have a chance to say hello prior to her presentation.
I am exhibiting my work because I ‘m worried about America as I’m sure many of you are, too. I’m afraid that America is changing and I can’t do anything to stop it. I’m afraid that America is becoming a place that I no longer recognize. I’m afraid that our children will grow up knowing a different America than the one we were raised in. I remember Walter Cronkite and I remember that the news hour was something really really important in my house. Why is the news disappearing from network television? - because corporations own the TV networks and it’s not profitable to cover news, so American news bureaus are closing all over the world.

When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and when the Germans marched into Poland, the American people knew who the enemy was.
For the first time in American history we are fighting an enemy most people know nothing about, namely Al-Queda. Who are these people? What do they want? Why do they hate us? Why don’t we know anything about these people? How many of them are there? How are they able to attract new adherents? Where is the news? We have soldiers on the ground in Afghanistan and we have no idea on a day to day basis how the war is going. What town are our soldiers in? How are the civilians doing? Are we winning or losing? Why don’t we know? Where is the news? According to the Pew Research Center only 60 % of the American people get their news from the computer. That means that 40% of the American people still get their news from television –which mostly covers local news. Where is this leading us? What is going to happen to America with an uniformed public?
I want to start my art talk with a work called ”Oh Say, Can You See?” – the opening lines of our national anthem. You see a TV set, a veil and an article. It would not be an overstatement to say that this article changed my life. It was written by David Barstow. It won a Pulitzer prize although noone knew about it because it wasn’t reported on network news. I used to assume that the generals who spoke about the war were giving objective, neutral opinions. After reading the article I realized that wasn’t the case. The article states that retired generals, were given talking points about the Iraq War from the Pentagon. Further, that they also worked as consultants to military companies and they profited financially from the war and from access to the Pentagon. .
Is there anything wrong with becoming a consultant
after you retire? Not at all – I’m a consultant myself..the difference is, I’m not a general that is sending our young people into war..
The question I want to ask all of you is.. is it ok that our generals become consultants for weapons manufacturers and then promote war on television? What do you say? I would really like to know..

The story gets more complicated…
Furthermore, retired General Barry Mc Caffrey is
a military analyst for NBC. NBC is owned by GE. GE not only makes refrigerators, they also manufacture missiles and engines for war planes... The second question is: … Is it OK for a company that makes missiles to also own TV stations? Or is there a conflict of interest? What does the audience feel about that?
Gen Eisenhower warned about a military –industrial complex in 1961. He could not have imagined a media-military-industrial complex.

What Did You Learn In School Today? Should really be called what didn’t you learn in school today? The painting is brightly colored with Wonder Bread dots
a pink film strip, Shirley Temple and Pluto. But underneath the happy surface is a sinister message –
Agent Orange and Depleted Uranium. The American people had no idea that the herbicide Agent Orange contained the poisin dioxin. Dioxin seeped into the soil and the groundwater of South Vietnam and caused 1/2 million birth defects. Depleted Uranium was used in the Gulf War as a tank-buster, which released radioactive particles into the air. Both our soldiers and the Iraqis are suffering from the after-effect of these weapons. The doll symbolizes the generations of victims that are suffering long after the war has stopped.

Another question:
Is it OK for America to use weapons that persist in the environment long after the war is over?

Home On The Range is a spoof on Grant Wood’s famous “American Gothic”. Grant shows an iconic American farm couple from the Midwest. I updated this image to show a couple of couch potatoes, in their reclining chairs, focused on the TV with a map of America in the background –their awareness of the world extends only to our borders.

Yankee Doodle Went To Town

This is a Postmodern painting because it is based on an earlier work by Tom Wesselman called “Still Life No.28”. I appropriated his composition in order to make a statement about how America has changed since he painted the picture. Wesselman’s picture reflects an America filled with the fruits of Post-War affluence. In my picture, Lincoln is replaced by a picture of oil-men and the tablecloth is imprinted with the name of Halliburton.

Portrait of Two Women

This painting take us to our honored guest. She is of course much more beautiful that her painting. I based the composition on a painting by German artist, Gerhard Richter, called Portrait of A Young Woman. It is
a portrait of a young woman named Ulrike Meinhof who was a founding member of the Baader-Meinhof gang, also known as the Red Army Faction – a violent group who tried to overthrow the German government of the 60’s and 70’s through the use of violence. I used
Richter’s composition to highlight the treatment of Bunnatine Greenhouse and Christine Axsmith (who worked for BAE Systems – waterboarding is torture –on personal blog -
They were fired and demoted for upholding the highest moral standards – instead of being recognized and applauded. They are heroes being treated like criminals, instead of criminals being treated like heroes.

Days At the Races

This painting focuses on Katrina. The left side represents the people of the ninth ward. The right side represents Michael Brown, who was the head of FEMA at the time of the hurricane. He was a lawyer with no experience in emergency management. However, he did serve as a commissioner for the International Arabian Horse Assoc. I thought it would be interesting to juxtapose the difference in their backgrounds..

Great American News

This painting tries to show that news and entertainment industry have merged. Theatrical masks border the smiling face of a reporter. The bottom of the painting selects elements from James Rosenquist “F-111”. His
painting done during the 1960’s links elements of militarism and consumerism.

Little Red

I came across this story on the BBc web-site and at first I thought it was some kind of joke. A thirteen year old girl,in Somalia, named Aisha Ibrahim Duhulow was raped on the way to visit her grandmother. Her parents reported the crime to the police. Unfortunately, the Al-Shabab. a fundamentalist Islamic group was in charge of her town. So they arrested Aisha and took her to a stadium and stoned her to death for the crime of having sex before marriage.

Helen of Troy

Helen of Troy simply states that we become accustomed to the idea of beauty because of what we are exposed to seeing every day. American magazines and fashion promote nudity and the Muslim world promotes modest dress.

Bosnia/ Bobbitt

The Bobbitt affair took place in 1993 at the height of the Bosnian conflict. It was a marital dispute that became violent. The TV networks covered this sensational story for weeks – while ethnic cleansing and murder was occurring in Europe. If it weren’t for BBC
coverage, I never would have known about the events in Europe.

White House/ Your House

President Clinton’s affair with his intern, Monika Lewinsky, in 1988, dominated the news for weeks –it is interesting to note that in 1988, also, Bin Laden formed a coalition called the Islamic Front for Jihad against Jews and Crusaders. Did you hear about it? There was a fatwa printed in a London newspaper against Americans . Did you hear about it? How would our lives have been changed if someone had heard about it and took it seriously?

Dusk, Railroad

This painting is a virtual copy of an iconic Hopper painting called Railroad, Sunset. Hopper’s setting is the lonely expanse of a railroad somewhere in the West at sunset. This painting inserts an image of a watchtower from Camp Delta, Guantanamo. The painting asks the question – with unlimited detention of the enemy , do we violate the Geneva Conventions/ our Bill of rights? How does this change our perceptions and the perceptions of the world as to what America is becoming?

Button/ Mushroom

This is a Conceptual painting because the meaning takes place in the mind. The four images alone have to be integrated. It pertains to nuclear proliferation – we are essentially one button away from blowing up the world.

La Toilette

This work is made of found objects. It is a take-off on Duchamp’s “Urinal”. The urinal was displayed in 1917 as a protest against the mass slaughter of World War I. This piece protests the collusion of military and media companies who influence the news.

Pies for Sale

A program called Worldfocus carried this story on PBS.
There is so much hunger in Haiti, that the mothers make cookies made of soil, sugar and oil. I was thinking of the American obsession with conspicuous consumption.

Cyclone
Our way of life depends on the import of oil. We export entertainment to the world. The image of little rectangles around the border symbolize the film industry.

This is the end of the art talk. I think that we the people have to demand better news. We have to try to stay informed even though it means searching out news that isn’t covered in mainstream media. I’ll be happy to answer any questions after “Bunny’s talk”. Thank you very much for coming.