Appropriation and Transgression in Contemporary American Performance: The Wooster Group, Holly Hughes, and Karen Finley

Abstract

A controversy has been raging in America recently about whether the desecration or destruction of the national flag is protected by free speech as defined by the Constitution. Two cases in particular that caught the public's eye were a flag-burning protest by a young Communist at the Republican National Convention in Dallas and an art work shown in a minority-student show at the Art Institute of Chicago, called What is the Proper Way to Display a U.S. Flag? The piece consisted of a photocollage of flag-draped coffins, a comment book on a stand, and an American flag laid on the floor, blocking access to the comment book. While Vietnam veterans and others were protesting the art work, the Supreme Court was deliberating on the constitutionality of the right to burn a flag as a form of free expression. It has since ruled that burning the flag does indeed come under the category of free speech. The protest over this decision even prompted President Bush to call for a constitutional amendment that exempts flag desecration from acts of free speech.

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