Harper government targeted artist for her green conscience, internal documents reveal
James has been blogging and uploading documents to her website since her tour was cancelled. She said she is determined to continue creating art, and is scheduled to self-publish a collection of visual essays in September. One of them is "What Is Harper Afraid Of?" and "Fat Cat Canada's Giant Litter Box," the essay cited by Ambassador Heatherington in his email to foreign embassy staffers.
One of the illustrations from the visual essay "What is Harper Afraid Of?" Courtesy of FrankeJames.com.
She is also waiting for more documents from access to information requests, to uncover as much as possible about who was involved in the discussion of her art, and why.
"Their desire to squelch any "dirty oil" message which could influence European policymakers (the fuel quality directive is being debated in Europe) overrides their concerns for free speech for Canadians," she wrote in an email. "Dissenting voices like mine are censored."
With files contributed by Gisela Gómez.
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(13) Comments
Amazing to think what would happen if the government went around the world warning about companies like Athabasca Oil Sands Corp, Baytex Energy Trust, Bonavista Energy Trust, BP, Bronco Energy Ltd, Canadian Natural Resources Ltd are up to.
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Harper Undemocratic Actions againgst Canadians. The campaign began a while ago. Shame, shame and more shame on this pack of fascists.
There is much too little information here to draw any conclusions about anything. It says nothing about what might be considered standard protocol or not, for example. I don't understand. So foreign affairs staffers knew of her existence... so what? Articles like this are unhelpful, because they imply things but don't actually provide much in the way of evidence or intelligent discussion or analysis.
Of course artist should have to be scared about making statements about polical awareness... I mean why should any of the artists, writers or musicians feel that they have any power to change the world around them? After all, historically; as a demografic conglomeration, the arts community has been nothing but a thorn in the side of politics for generations. Lets just wipe out all the populous with a functioning cerebral cortex and then we will have mechanical grunts to perform all the manual labour while we reap the benefits of their efforts? Isn't that what media control is all about? I commend Franky James.
Sorry, as an artist I don't believe taxpayers should fund artists exhibitions nor travel, don't see waiters or waitresses getting taxpayers money and they work damn hard!
^^Okay, then do you also think that serving legal drugs (ie alcohol) to a bunch of mouthy, rude people is tantamount to actively educating the public through visual discourse?
I've done both art and bartending, and I can tell you - they're both hard jobs, but one is FAR more important than the other. It's not the bartender who starts the revolution, he's just the sucker who cleans up the vomit thereafter.
I would be honoured to represent Canada abroad - with or without a political agenda - and yes, I would attempt to secure public funding to do it. It's not the $5,000 that's the biggest issue (you can't get far on that) but the $75,000 corporate sponsorship withdrawn after intimidation is a total kick in the balls.
This isn't about whether or not you agree with this drawing or that, and it's not even about whether or not art should be publicly funded. It's about stifling a voice that dared to speak out and question a government's motives.
And if you want to get down to the nuts and bolts of it, this little venture probably cost them MORE in time and money than if they had just given her the $5,000.
Harper Undemocratic Actions againgst Canadians. The campaign began a while ago. Shame, shame and more shame on this pack of fascists.
Very nice acronym! I'm spreading that one.
The PC majority just passed Bill 29 which will make access to information even harder in Newfoundland. Look it up. Spread the word.
Sorry, as an artist I don't believe taxpayers should fund artists exhibitions nor travel, don't see waiters or waitresses getting taxpayers money and they work damn hard!
As an 'artist' do you support the government calling up the source of the private funding to persuade them to cancel their PRIVATE funding ? Perhaps you missed this detail of Conservative party behavior. I would also point out the quote that refers to her work as " against the men and women in the forest and gas sector of our great country" . The positioning of enviromental criticism as counter to other working people is to misrepresent the science of health AND long term investment that makes a society secure and accountable to the coming generations of humans.
Lastly I suspect the reason that Canada is described as a 'great country' is to threaten your individual doubts and not as a celebration of a free thinking democracy that is lucky enough to exist in this area of the planet Earth.
As an 'artist' and taxpayer do you support your representatives persuading a private funder to withdraw their PRIVATE support? I wonder what the content of that phone call was...But I'm sure that typifying enviromental concerns as counter to the working classes interests is ridiculous. A healthy economy is a manifestation of a healthy populous that is accountable to the health of future generations. Watch out for more misrepresenting statements from these radicals that use terms like "this great country".
It seems to me what is behind much of the dislike of artists is the power good artists have to express visually the state of the times we are living in, and to give a creative response to opinion on any aspect of our economic and social situation, that can easily be recognized in a visual context. Harperism feels artists should be watched and muzzled if they make visual statements that are against the government's beliefs. Artists are like scientists, we explore, experiment, research and then create something unique, unusal, and thus maybe controversial to have viewers think deeper about what the artist is trying to convey about the state of our society and liefstyles. The government seems to feel that what is good for the masses is art that is safe art, that doesn't make a strong revealing statement, but is simply aesthetically 'nice', so we all just become passive. Art is integral to society as the element that promotes free thinking and expression, to enliven people's imagination and promotes visions of choices to exposing anything that has potential to decay our individual freedom of rights to be open minded communities, and not repressed ones, that may become boring. The Nazi regime and Stalin rid and hid art to books to music that was not in their order of thought, and only allowed art that was safe, which only passified people to live simple safe lives. Harperism ideally wants that. He will also keep blacklisting, so we as artists are controlled and not reacting collectively as a movement in opposing government regulations and rules of law.
I short, what I have given more thought to is the main motive or reason for the Harper government to repress, harass, intimidate an innocent artist, focusing on Franke James.
It is a good choice for them, since it is a woman and an artist. Harper and regime is repressing her, using her as an example, to scare other Canadian artists. They hope the attention on her will convey to other artists that, if you mess around with government views and express freely about the government making wrong decisions, then they'll come after you, as an artist.