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The DNAinfo archives brought to you by WNYC.
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LGBT Museum in SoHo Challenges Whitney's Rejection of Nude Male Sculpture

A small gay art gallery in SoHo is taking issue with the Whitney Museum's rejection of a work of art the museum commissioned from sculptor Charles Ray.

Ray's sculpture depicts two nude men and is titled "Huck & Jim," inspired by a scene in the classic American novel "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" and in honor of the Whitney's identity as a museum of American art. In the scene, Huck and Jim, the slave he runs away with, lie naked on a raft debating the origin of stars.

The Whitney was supposed to display the work in the plaza in front of their new building in the Meatpacking District, but ultimately decided not to, in order to avoid offending tourists on their way to the High Line.
 

The Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art took issue with the museum's decision, however. And on Thursday, they took the issue to Twitter, tweeting an offer to Ray to display his work.

Hunter O’Hanian, the Leslie-Lohman Museum's director told DNAinfo New York he found the Whitney's decision "ludicrous," and speculated that the museum would not have made the same decision if the statue featured naked women.

"It's interesting that some other institutions have a hard time showing the human body when it is male.  They seem to have no problem showing female forms, but the naked male form seems to scare them," O'Hanian said.

An account in the New Yorker revealed that the Whitney's director and chief curator worried that showing "a naked African-American man and a naked white teen-ager in close proximity" would upset tourists in the neighborhood.

O'Hanian dismissed the reading of gay sexuality and race issues into the work, insisting that the statue "is completely non-sexual," and pointing out that Mark Twain's novel is famously a story for children.

"This," he said, "is the reason why we at the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay & Lesbian Art are not afraid to take risks and show art that others are afraid to show. Charles Ray is an accomplished artist. He depicts familiar ideas and themes and ideas in a very honest fashion. People should not be afraid of that honesty."

Ray's sculpture is currently on display at the Art Institute of Chicago.