Myra Hindley picture uproar question....?

Question

A snippet of this picture appeared in a 2012 Olympic promo and caused uproar.

This picture was controversial when it first appeared.

Ignoring the appearance in the promo film, and just considering it as a picture. Is it any worse than say making a film about Jack the Ripper?

Answer 1

The work was designed to court controversy at the outset otherwise the artist could have picked a less loaded image. Of course the work is partly about societies relationship to certain "charged" images and how all images are seen within a context that goes beyond the image itself. The original photo of Myra Hindley has appeared everywhere in print since the sixties and so has become iconic within the British psyche. Had the image of Rose West been used instead of Hindley's the work would have been a lot less effective because how many people remember what Rose West looks like? So it is clearly the iconic nature of the image and not the nature of the crime that effects people so. This also highlights a certain hypocrisy that it is OK to use this image as long as it is accompanied by a suitably prurient and condemning article but it is not OK for an artist to use it even to comment on the power of such iconography. So I am sure that the reaction of some of the other people answering this question is exactly the sort of reaction the artist Marcus Harvey was trying to elicit.

Personally, I find the work sensationalist and a little crass. It is a bit too easy to recontextualise a suitably loaded image for effect. It is the sort of thing one does at art school and is perhaps a little juvenile.

However to answer your question is it worse than a film about Jack the Ripper? I don't even think it is as bad as say the Daily Mail using this image in a news story because at least the artist is consciously aware of the iconographic nature of this image. I even think it was wise to include it within the promotional film. Whether you like it or not this image is a British as a London Bus, Winston Churchill smoking a cigar or Lord Kitchener urging us to "sign up".

Answer 2

Yes it is worse,  the film is about what he did & was not used to promote.

Could the Olympic Council get any lower??

Answer 3

There's a line between reality and fiction. I see where you are coming from, but Myra Hindley did kill children and the relatives of those children are still alive and suffering. Jack the Ripper is an unsolved crime and his victims are only remembered by the fact he killed them.

The artist that created the Hindley portrait did so for personal fame and fortune. The author, director, actors and sound man created a work of fiction based on historical fact.

A portrait of Hindley would have been a better representation if it had showed her after she had been slashed by a fellow inmate. An ugly woman with a stanley blade tattoo across her face.

As for the Olympic presentation? Both Gordon and Boris crossed the political divide in their response; so lets say it was Nationally unacceptable.

Answer 4

well yeah cause 1) it has nothin to do with anythin olympics wise and 2) she killed innocent kids and jack the ripper killed prostitutes who were livin that sort of dangerous life like they knew it probably gonna happen anyway

Answer 5

The picture was apparently made up of loads of kiddies hand prints which personally i find disgusting..all in the name of art!!

She should never have had her face shown as part of the 'culture of london', what the h**l has she got to do with London's culture anyway?

I live 10 minutes away from where she and bradey commited those murders and believe me this hasn't gone down well here.  

She was just murdering scum who should have been given the death sentence.

Answer 6

No its not any different, its all art, whether its canvas or film, i admire the man who did it, its very thought provoking. It was intended to shock people, and it certainly did that. I feel it shouldnt have been shown in the olympic film though, only because to the general public it is a Myra Hindley photo but to those in the art world its an iconic painting from the Tate associated with london, that was the only reason it was in there, a fuss over nothing, but others obviously wouldnt see it like that