[img caption=”A detail from the Woodburn 100 mural.” float=”right” width=”289″ height=”349″ render=”<%photoRenderType%>”]8798[/img]AT INDIANA UNIVERSITY, students are lobbying to have a decades-old work of art removed from a classroom on campus. The work is part of a multi-panel depiction of the history of Indiana that celebrated muralist Thomas Hart Benton painted for exhibition at the Chicago World Fair in 1933. Commissioned by the governor of Indiana–a state that only a decade before had been politically controlled by the Ku Klux Klan–the mural didn’t shy away from what was arguably the most shameful period in the state’s history. Prominent in one of the panels–the one now under fire–is a depiction of Klan members burning a cross in front of a church. The contested panel is one of two sections of the mural currently hanging in room 100 of the Woodburn building, an auditorium-style classroom used for political science, history, and other liberal arts classes. Last week, the Black Student Union held a town hall meeting with administrators to complain about the artistic depiction of the Klan in a classroom, where, they point out, students cannot avoid it. A columnist for the student paper, the Indiana Daily Student, agreed, saying the mural should be removed to a museum (a move that might damage the mural), so that students who are offended by it could avoid seeing it. The fact that the painting is actually anti-Klan is immaterial, the writer argued: “Many students have found it offensive over the years. While it might be educational to many, this isn’t enough to risk offending even a handful of students.” “The University’s mission is to educate,” wrote Alexis Silas, “and perhaps this controversial artwork is educational. But education shouldn’t come at the expense of someone’s feelings.” Students have previously complained about the picture. In 1997 the university produced a video about the mural for professors holding lectures in Woodburn 100 to explain the state’s history and Benton’s intent for students. Professors are not required to show the video, however, and the Indiana Daily Student reported that few students at last week’s meeting had heard of it. Cherie Wardell, an executive of the Black Student Union, said yesterday that the work was fine as art but that the university knows it offends many students. Although she had no concrete evidence, Wardell claimed that alumni, mostly white, who do not have to look at the picture every day are influential in keeping it in its place. “It’s not fair that white dollars are considered more important than black voices,” she said. The Black Student Union plans to file a complaint this week with the Racial Incidents Team, a group of administrators that is supposed to help smooth over contentious issues relating to race. The group says the mural is valuable as art, but to be understood in its proper context, which is the history of the state, should be displayed in a museum, preferably with all the panels together (other panels are displayed elsewhere on campus). The students will also argue that, if it cannot be taken down, the mural should be covered while classes or other events with students are in session. At a faculty council meeting in 1998, when the “mural problem” last came up, there was a discussion of whether to require a showing of the education video to all classes using Woodburn 100. The council decided simply to encourage the showing of the video, but reportedly it has not been widely shown. Some IU professors do use the mural as a teaching tool. Perhaps, while they still have the chance to do so, the petitions of the Black Student Union will encourage more of their colleagues to do the same. Thomas Hart Benton didn’t want to allow a curtain to be drawn over Indiana’s past. How ironic it would be if his mural and that past both ended up behind a curtain. Beth Henary is an editorial assistant at The Weekly Standard.
