135 I then put my final question to Berlinde De Bruyckere by asking her, given the uncomfortable and sacrosanct power of her anti-art, whether she has ever encountered that abuse of respect that goes by the name of censorship. Her words leave no room for misunderstanding. «I’ve never personally encountered it, but the current cancel culture is mortifying. Studying art history has taught us everything: how people lived, how they chose to communicate, what inspired them, their fears, desires and passions, unfiltered. I strongly feel that artists who serve the larger scope of things and focus on the human experience as a shared experience will always get recognition, as the questions their work raises – and the answers these questions may ignite – are universal. A powerful work of art is always a synthesis of society. Society is simply not a pretty picture; the future is not looking that bright, without the due respect for complexity. I think it’s an artist’s responsibility to address and capture this complexity. If this leads to challenging statements, or unseemly images, so be it. But to reduce reality to something that is containable, safe, straightforward and acceptable is to deny it. Censorship is nothing but the legitimisation of that denial». In the closing of the speech he was to give at the Congress of the Radical Party, referring to the artists, Pasolini wrote: «Against all this you have to do nothing else (I believe) than simply continue to be yourselves: which means being continually unrecognisable. To immediately forget the great successes: and to continue undaunted, obstinate, eternally contrary, to demand, to want, to identify yourselves with the different; to scandalise». Two days before the congress, Pasolini was murdered. This is the last script that we have left of him. And it contains exactly the duty of art, in its call to the defence of respect. warm thanks to Silvia Pichini (head of communication) and to Margherita Tinagli (artist liaison) @ Galleria Continua
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