Posted on: Wednesday, August 15, 2001

City says rejected artwork came in too late

By Robbie Dingeman
Advertiser City Hall Writer

City officials say artwork rejected for an exhibit at Honolulu Hale in March was excluded not because of content, but because it was too big and turned in too late.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Hawai'i yesterday filed a lawsuit in federal court charging that the city violated the civil rights of artist Daria Fand by banning the display of Fand's piece titled "Last of the Believers," which depicts a nude woman on a cross.

Brent White, state legal director for the ACLU, said the city deprived Fand of her right to free speech so as not to offend Christian conservatives in the community.

Fand was invited by the Honolulu County Committee on the State of Women and the Mayor's Office on Culture and the Arts to submit work for an exhibit titled "The Art of Women: Celebrating the Challenges and Successes of Girl and Women Artists with Disabilities."

Marylucia Arace, who was the chair of the Honolulu County Committee on the Status of Women at the time of the exhibit, said yesterday the committee's guidelines for entries excluded the painting. "Ms. Fand's entry came in too late and was too large to be accepted," Arace said.

The committee required art to be submitted by Feb. 24 and be no larger than 1.5 feet by 2 feet, Arace said, while Fand's work was submitted the second week of March and was 5 feet by 3.5 feet.

White called the city's explanation a "pretext made up to detract attention that it was censorship," and said most of the art featured in the show was larger than Fand's.

He said Fand submitted two paintings on the same day. One was accepted, while the excluded painting wasn't.

White also said the committee's own minutes from March 22 show that the decision to remove Fand's painting was made by the mayor's Office of Culture and Arts, and not the committee.

The committee put together a catalog that featured Fand's painting, which showed the panel "already accepted her piece and determined that it was going to be in the exhibit," White said.

Advertiser staff writer Curtis Lum contributed to this report.