The academicians were not told that works to be included in the show, USA Today, which opens on October 6, would be of an explicit sexual nature. They were informed only that some would be “cutting edge”.
Instead, there are a number of items depicting a range of sex acts, including one involving a girl who appears to be a young teenager. Another work consists of rows of religious statuettes with phallic symbols attached.
Some of the artists have admitted their works are pornographic. Some members of the academy are now demanding that a separate room be set aside for the “adult” works.
“We gave the show a cautious go-ahead,” said Ivor Abrahams, an academician and sculptor, who sits on the exhibitions committee and was present at a meeting last spring which, with some dissenters, approved USA Today. “Now we find that at least 10 or so of the works might cause offence. It’s schoolboy smut and a cynical ploy to get Saatchi even more noticed.”
Abrahams now believes that the show should not go ahead. “We’ve been hijacked by Saatchi,” he said. “It is hard to see any merit in this show.”
Leonard McComb, another academician, agreed. “Saatchi is using the academy for his own commercial benefit,” he said. “If we are to put on a show by young artists it should be of young British artists, not Americans.”
Saatchi, Britain’s leading art impresario, is relishing the row. “My impatience to show the works together with my fascination with the RA proved irresistible,” he said. “I also enjoy their passionate and noisy airing of views. They’re all as cracked as me.”
Works going on display include a girl painted by Gerald Davis performing a sex act on a man. Davis, whose other works on show include naked youngsters, penises and a woman defecating, admits that some of his art stems from his own fantasies from when he was 12.
Another artist, Terence Koh, who is gay, not only states that some of his exhibits incorporate “artist’s piss”, but also admits that they are “decadent and pornographic”. One of them, Untitled (Medusa), shows religious figures, including women, with prominent phalluses.
Some academicians are as worried about Saatchi using the academy for a publicity stunt as they are about the pornographic works. John Hoyland, the abstract painter, said the RA should not “be subsidising a dealer like Saatchi. It is not healthy that the Royal Academy is promoting bogus art for commercial reasons”.
Although the works owned by Saatchi on show at the RA will not be for sale, their display at such a prestigious establishment will increase their value.
Tom Phillips, the chairman of the exhibitions committee, said the show was justified. “It should be seen in the wider context of American art today. There are more serious and worrying things going on in the world than somebody having oral sex, which you can anyway see all the time on the internet,” he said.
Saatchi, whose last two exhibitions in County Hall, London, received poor reviews, warned: “Those who are in the business of being offended shouldn’t be too disappointed by the show.”
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