Sue Buzzi was fired as executive director of the Broward Art Guild after board members expressed displeasure over the airing of a ‘Daily Show’ segment about a painting that showed President Bush being sodomized by an Arab.
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Sue Buzzi was fired as executive director of the Broward Art Guild after board members expressed displeasure over the airing of a ‘Daily Show’ segment about a painting that showed President Bush being sodomized by an Arab.
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By PHIL LaPADULA
Friday, July 29, 2005
The Broward Art Guild’s annual “Controversy” show is intended to “stir emotions,” “make people think” and “provoke debate” on the contentious issues of the day, said Sue Buzzi, the guild’s former executive director, during an interview with the Express in May.
This year’s show appears to have accomplished its mission — more than Buzzi could ever have imagined at the opening of the show.
In fact, the flap over the show appears to have cost Buzzi her job.
Buzzi, who had served as the guild’s executive director for 12 years, was abruptly fired from her $9,600-a-year job July 21 by the guild’s newly elected board.
The hoopla over the “Controversy” exhibit focused primarily on a piece called “Yahoo!” in which President Bush is depicted bent over an oil barrel, getting sodomized by an Arab sheik. The painting is the work of local gay artist Alfred Phillips.
The piece made headlines when another local artist, Michael Friedman, complained to the county’s cultural affairs director about the sexual nature of “Yahoo!” saying it was inappropriate to depict the president in such a fashion. Friedman also expressed concern that children might see what he called a sexually explicit image.
At the time, Buzzi refused to pull the painting, but relocated it to a more obscure section of the exhibit. Her move sparked a national debate about art censorship.
That debate culminated in the art guild being featured on Comedy Central’s “Daily Show with Jon Stewart.”
Buzzi maintained that the publicity from the show enhanced the guild’s visibility and increased its donations, membership and attendance at recent shows.
But it was a visibility that didn’t impress new board members.
Buzzi said she was let go shortly after some board members told her they were displeased with the “Daily Show” segment, which aired July 13.
In the segment, Buzzi at times appeared flustered.
The “Daily Show” interviewed Buzzi as well as artists Alfred Phillips and Michael Friedman at the guild’s gallery in Fort Lauderdale.
In the “Daily Show” segment, titled “Total Eclipse of the Art,” host Ed Helms asked Phillips, “Is this your Mona Lisa?”
Phillips explained that the Bush piece was intended to illustrate that the war in Iraq is “all about oil.” He went on to say that Friedman’s objections “may be a little homophobia.”
In response, Friedman said, “Seventy percent of my friends are gay.”
As Helms was interviewing Buzzi, he turned the camera on a piece of art that wasn’t part of the “Controversy” show.
“What’s this? My little brother who’s 2 could have done this,” Helms said.
At that point, Buzzi said, “I’m out of here,” and walked off the set. Buzzi explained that Helms had broken a promise not to film artwork that wasn’t part of the “Controversy” show.
Phillips defended Buzzi, noting that her flustered appearance on the show was largely the result of “The Daily Show’s” editing.
Shortly after the filming of the “Daily Show” segment in late June, the Express contacted Buzzi, but she declined to comment, saying “my job is on the line.”
Like a surreal collage, all of the principals in the “Controversy” dispute appeared together in public at the guild’s small gallery on NE 13th Street in Fort Lauderdale the day after Buzzi’s firing. They were there for the opening of the guild’s Summer Exhibition.
Phillips was there, accepting a second-place award for his painting “Lake House,” an abstract landscape piece.
Phillips said Buzzi’s firing “gives the appearance that censorship is alive and well at the Broward Art Guild.”
Despite the unexpected limelight, Phillips said he would “absolutely” be willing to participate in the “Controversy” show again and to poke fun at Bush again.
Michael Friedman was also at the Summer Exhibition opening. Friedman’s own piece in the “Controversy” show depicted Pope Benedict XVI adrift in an unholy sea of swastikas. That piece prompted some critics to call it Catholic-bashing.
Despite being the man to spark the flap over “Controversy,” Friedman is now a strong defender of Buzzi.
He described the new executive committee of the board as “bullies.”
Julia Andrews, the newly elected president of the guild’s board, explained that the board voted Buzzi out in a “confidential, closed executive session.”
Asked whether the uproar over “Controversy” led to Buzzi’s dismissal, Andrews said, “It wasn’t one particular thing.”
Asked if she was satisfied with the way Buzzi handled the “Controversy” flap, Andrews said only, “No comment.”
But Kate Barnett, a lesbian member of the guild’s board who voted to keep Buzzi as executive director, said the new board members were unhappy about the “Daily Show” segment.
“They thought it was distasteful and that we were made to look like idiots,” Barnett said. “I kept saying, ‘It’s a comedy show, they make fun of everybody.’ But I don’t think any of them have much of a sense of humor.”
Barnett thinks board members acted callously in firing Buzzi without any warning. Over the years, Barnett noted, Buzzi had guided the guild through some very difficult financial times and had built its reputation in the local arts community.
Barnett also said the “Controversy” uproar “generated donations and new memberships.”
Buzzi said some of the new board members complained that they were not consulted before she appeared on the “Daily Show.”
“I didn’t have time to contact each one of them,” she said.
Buzzi noted that she did contact Barnett, who was president of the board at the time. Barnett gave the OK for the filming at the guild.
“If they’re going to blame anyone, they should blame me,” Barnett said. “I told her, ‘Go for it. It’s publicity. It’s national TV.’”
Buzzi was unapologetic about both the “Daily Show” and the “Controversy” show, which she thinks gave the guild a boost.
“We have people coming here now who never knew we existed,” Buzzi said. “But I don’t think [the board] saw the big picture. It’s ironic that this all snowballed from a show called ‘Controversy,’” she mused. “Censorship is an ugly thing.”
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