Roger Brown
Fear No Evil, 1991
Color silkscreen
36" x 36"
Edition of 50 plus 3 artist's proofs
4922
Created in 1991, during the height of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, this print by Roger Brown depicts the American politician Jesse Helms with five hands, covering his eyes, ears, and mouth....
Created in 1991, during the height of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, this print by Roger Brown depicts the American politician Jesse Helms with five hands, covering his eyes, ears, and mouth. Helms represented the State of North Carolina in the United States Senate from 1973 to 2003. Among other issues, he was a staunch opponent of LGBTQ rights, Civil Rights, and the National Endowment of the Arts.
Brown was born in the American South, and his work frequently explored the complex dichotomy of his relationship to the place of his birth. He simultaneously loved the landscape, certain aspects of the culture, and many of the people, while loathing the closed-minded nature of many of the institutions of power.
The same year Brown made this print, Senator Helms publicly attacked the NEA, and introduced an amendment to the government appropriations bill that prohibited the organization from financing any artists or works of art that depicted “sexual or excretory activities or organs in an offensive way.” The amendment was a direct response to NEA funding for a series of photographs by the artist Robert Mapplethorpe, a gay man. It passed the senate 68 to 28.
That same year, Helms was also responsible for a letter writing campaign that convinced then President George H. W. Bush to keep HIV/AIDS on the list of diseases that could cause individuals from foreign countries to be banned from traveling to the United States, making the US the only 1st world nation to prohibit travel based on having that disease.
In the New York Times, Helms was quoted as saying, “Nothing positive happened to Sodom and Gomorrah and nothing positive is likely to happen to America if our people succumb to the drumbeats of support for the homosexual lifestyle.”
As a gay man, an artist, and as someone who was diagnosed as HIV positive in 1988, Brown was a triple threat to Helms and to the powerful, right wing conservatives whose interests he represented. The subtle and artful commentary in this print demonstrates the wit and class with which Brown so frequently responded to his critics.
This limited edition print is held in the permanent collections of many esteemed institutions, including MOMA, The Art Institute of Chicago, Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Benedictine University Library, and the Milwaukee Art Museum.
Brown was born in the American South, and his work frequently explored the complex dichotomy of his relationship to the place of his birth. He simultaneously loved the landscape, certain aspects of the culture, and many of the people, while loathing the closed-minded nature of many of the institutions of power.
The same year Brown made this print, Senator Helms publicly attacked the NEA, and introduced an amendment to the government appropriations bill that prohibited the organization from financing any artists or works of art that depicted “sexual or excretory activities or organs in an offensive way.” The amendment was a direct response to NEA funding for a series of photographs by the artist Robert Mapplethorpe, a gay man. It passed the senate 68 to 28.
That same year, Helms was also responsible for a letter writing campaign that convinced then President George H. W. Bush to keep HIV/AIDS on the list of diseases that could cause individuals from foreign countries to be banned from traveling to the United States, making the US the only 1st world nation to prohibit travel based on having that disease.
In the New York Times, Helms was quoted as saying, “Nothing positive happened to Sodom and Gomorrah and nothing positive is likely to happen to America if our people succumb to the drumbeats of support for the homosexual lifestyle.”
As a gay man, an artist, and as someone who was diagnosed as HIV positive in 1988, Brown was a triple threat to Helms and to the powerful, right wing conservatives whose interests he represented. The subtle and artful commentary in this print demonstrates the wit and class with which Brown so frequently responded to his critics.
This limited edition print is held in the permanent collections of many esteemed institutions, including MOMA, The Art Institute of Chicago, Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Benedictine University Library, and the Milwaukee Art Museum.
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