Visual artist Fabián Cháirez is once again exhibiting his controversial paintings with religious, lesbian, and homoerotic motifs in the exhibition “The Second Coming of the Lord,” which opened at the Museum of Mexico City. This comes after the previous exhibition of the same pieces at the UNAM’s San Carlos Academy was closed by order of a judge who had granted an injunction to religious groups.
In a tour of the exhibition, which includes the same nine pieces from the previous exhibition, he reflected on freedom of expression in the country and called for its defense: “Freedom is always at stake, and it is something that is incumbent on us to defend, not only certain groups, like the LGBT community, who are always advocating for it, or the feminist or indigenous movement, but all people.
“It’s something that goes beyond gender or social position, and I think it’s something we must always fight for. “There will always be people or groups like those who tried to censor my previous exhibition, against human rights and freedoms, in favor of their personal interests,” said the artist, who rose to international fame in 2019 for the controversy surrounding his work “The Revolution,” which depicts a figure resembling Emiliano Zapata wearing high heels, naked, and riding a horse with an erect penis.
After commenting that he had obtained support from the Mexico City Ministry of Culture to carry out this new exhibition of his pieces, Cháirez affirmed that there are differences in the museum’s facilities that make him feel safer.
“In the previous one, access was free, so the work, the team, and even visitors were a little more exposed, which was what worried me most. More than the artwork being damaged, what worried me most was the safety of the people,” said the artist, who doesn’t rule out further attempts to censor his work.
“These individuals are trying to find any pretext to draw attention to their conservative and far-right proposals. I think, above all, they are trying to manipulate information and will use any pretext, whether it’s my exhibition or any other topic. So, I have no doubt they will try again.”
Regarding the trial process surrounding his work, he explained that insufficient evidence was presented against him. However, he is in talks with his lawyers to plan a follow-up defense.
Source: oem
