Teddy Bears around campus?

Sometimes art classes will put their projects around campus for people to see. Maybe it could be the same kind of thing like that tree outside the art annex that's wrapped in cloth.

Anyways, the killer bears outside of the VC yesterday were HILARIOUS! Made me laugh so hard :)

That's not even the half of it. By the Visitor Info center, there's a swine flu bear and in Fairhaven's woods there's a hippie bear with a saw.

 there is one north garden street near holly. quite hilarious. 

I think they are creepy as hell. Especially the swine flu one. The rational part of me is like, "oh, now that is interesting". The paranoid and cynical part of my imagination makes me think they're being used by the man for surveilance. Totally unreasonable but still... :)

The priest bear defiling the little bear near the library was weird.

super funny

Am going to agree with you. Haven't seen the swine flu one, but the one by the VC made me double think dinner.

 a friend of mine put them up around campus. they are not named, they are not a project for a class, they are to amuse you, make you angry, make you think... etc. 

and it was the priest bear.

Now, ok, religion aside, what part of child molestation is funny? I just heard a news bite that detailed this HUGE investigation in a bunch of Ireland's Catholic schools, finally looking into 50+ years of alleged child abuse and discovering that it was all true.

these children are now adults who will have these scars for the rest of their lives. These people who call themselves priests are sick individuals who need extensive help (and maybe chemical castration).

Pedophilia and child abuse is not a joke. and that bear set up outside the library was tasteless and heartless.

I'm not even offended that this person who set up these bears was "poking fun" at so-called religious people; i'm offended that they would poke fun at something extremely serious and abominable.

It didn't even make me angry; it made me really discouraged. I mean, is THIS what my generation finds "amusing"?

Teddy bears are serious business. Everything else is amusing, though.

I totally agree with the post two above mine.

The one outside of the VC was nasty and unpleasant, but the one outside the library was just not ok. I can't believe someone would waste their money on buying bears so they can do gross things with them and bother everyone else. When I walked by the one outside Haggard, I stopped, went back, and was so close to taking it down and throwing it away. However, for some reason there was a crowd of people out in Red Square that night and I didn't want to make a scene.

Child rape is just not something you joke about. What if there were people who have been abused by those situations who walked past that and saw it? I don't think they would think it was very funny.

To the person who said they know this person: you should suggest to your friend that they get a life or seek help.

What about the bears depicting murder? This is generally a worse crime, and more people have felt it than child rape. If you're going to rally against violent crimes used in art you shouldn't pick and choose based upon which ones are socially acceptable and which aren't.

to the post above the one above mine.

HOLY **** GET OVER YOUSELF.

they're funny. thats it.

good job, it was funny, thats it. Im sure it was not to hurt anyone or anything.
goodness.

No, you're right.

I guess I just looked at the murder one and thought of it more as something animals naturally do in the wild... to get their supper. However, animals don't tend to eat others of the same species I suppose.
 
I don't know, a dead animal is just a less foreign concept to me than an animal molesting a baby animal. So I didn't think as much of it.

But yeah, both of them were gross.

I thought they were hilarious.  Highly amusing.  Teddy bears always used to scare me when I was little, and seeing them like this is just amusing to me.  Sure, not all of them are the most PC, but people, think before you freak.  It's no different than watching comedy central.  Actually, this is a LOT tamer than what's in news papers, what's on tv, and what's all over the internet.  Those teddybears were WAY more acceptable to me, than the "flyers" PETA people pass out with pictures of REAL animals being shredded and killed.  Now, PETA, that's something to get grossed out and angry about.

Ugh, PETA again. PETA basically uses scare tactics to get people to support animal rights. But their fliers have a point, in PETA's eyes, the fliers tell people "the truth" (their words, not mine) about animal cruelty. These bears seems to just be for the "artist's" amusement, to see what people would do:

Stats:
Art Project by Jack (me) and Kelley from Fairhaven for an installation art class.

Point:
Using stuffed bears to poke fun at a variety of topics. I guess no one saw the bear reading porn outside the library with condoms for arms and bear liquids on the pages, it must have been taken down rather quickly hah. Simply, we wanted to see the reactions of students around campus. Sometimes people need ot be made uncomfortable. It was pretty interesting seeing how offended people got about teddy bears. See our point?

Glad people thought it was funny! :)

its amazing to me that people could be so offended by this. good project

I'm glad you failed to address the fact that some of those topics are NOT funny and can be damaging to individuals affected by said topics (or secondary survivors, e.g., friends, family, et cetera). It is never about the object. It is about what it represents. What you made the objects represent is inappropriate and feasibly damaging. I'd like to hear you explain that instead of feeling good inside because one person said something was "funny."

Hippy Bear (Near Fairhaven second floor entrance)
http://img20.imageshack.us/img20/8820/82928761.jpg
http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/9494/28106442.jpg

SwineFlu Bear (Outside health center)
http://img189.imageshack.us/img189/7573/13315096.jpg
http://img36.imageshack.us/img36/484/45232198.jpg

"I Drink Naked Juice To Stay Healthy, But These Chips Were On Sale" Bear (See in pics)
http://img35.imageshack.us/img35/4977/30573463.jpg
http://img34.imageshack.us/img34/2871/55525434.jpg

Dining Bear (VU Dining Hall)
http://img37.imageshack.us/img37/4379/96751114.jpg
http://img39.imageshack.us/img39/2394/23434706.jpg

Pedobear (Red Square)
http://img189.imageshack.us/img189/8674/70978240.jpg
http://img38.imageshack.us/img38/9781/54363519.jpg

NSFW Porno Bear (Wilson Lib)
http://img38.imageshack.us/img38/5774/44077365.jpg
http://img37.imageshack.us/img37/4272/17141299.jpg

Pics by Jack
Bears by Jack and Kelley

fantastic. vunderbear! 

because yes, art does need to defamiliarize us to the things we've become numb to, essentially make us uncomfortable to make us realize how uncomfortable we should be about certain things (killing people and raping children), I am deeply disturbed and concerned by the fact that intelligent, rational adults would 1. poke fun at things that are profoundly serious and damaging, and 2. find the poking of such fun actually amusing.

again, it's not that i'm "angry" at you students whose project this was, or even at the project itself. I am greatly concerned that anyone, whether artist or not, would find it both necessary and humorous to "poke fun" at such horrific tragedies that plauge our human existence as murder and child rape. 

In fact, i'd probably have a very different reaction if your point was to incite anger, to defamiliarize to the point of disgust, to shake us from our numbness against these vile happenings and make us realize, Oh, right, these things are terrible. But you, self admittedly, wanted to "poke fun," and that aim cannot be respected. and on top of that, some of the reactions listed in this post are humor. Humor?

What depths of depravity we've sunk to.

One of the artist's explained points was also to make a statement about needless outrage. I am usually quite sensitive to what would offend people, but I honestly couldnt think of a single thing teddy bears could do that would offend me. Perhaps I wouldnt laugh at the subject matter, but still, they're teddy bears. Also, people dont find the pedophile bear funny because there is anything inherently hilarious about pedophelia: it's because its the absurdity of a teddy bear. In this day and age there are so many different things to become outraged about, one needs to pick their battles. For instance, if porn offends you, then there is porn in gas stations and bookstores and students looking at porn in their dorm rooms to be pissed about: being angry about a teddy bear looking at porn is a major waste of effort. One thing I feel that we learn in college is that there are too many different things that need changing to make a difference in all of them: it comes down to picking your battles. No offense intended to anyone but if you found the subject matter offensive and it remained with you for more than five minutes, even after the realization that they're just teddy bears, the artist has proved his point about needless outrage.

I don't think that mocking harsh realities with teddy bears constitutes depravity. Reactions similar to yours were prevalent at the "sensations" art show, both in England and at the Brooklyn Art Museum in NYC. see here: http://www.trincoll.edu/depts/csrpl/RINVol2No3/BVM%20at%20BMA.htm

The catholic community was in an outrage because the display of a portrait of the virgin mary made with elephant dung was made possible with public funds. I saw the piece, it was not as offensive as the teddy bears. What I mean is, it did not feel like is was created to incite a negative reaction. Yet, there was more outrage over the virgin mary then say, the sculpture of an artists head made from his own frozen blood attached to a refrigeration unit, or a real vivisected pig, or a dead cow head being gnawed upon by a colony of flies. 

Artists who shock are often judged on the basis that art should not be shocking, but without some level of cultural impact art is not art. At some threshold it becomes craft. So should artists push for the most shocking thing they can to be true artists?

Well, probably not. Maybe some of my contemporary art history buffs can help me here. I don't think that Jeff Koons' 'made in heaven' series did very well... Yet, I found it incredibly stimulating. You can find his works here: http://www.jeffkoons.com/

But, it would seem, no matter how hard the art community tries to push (in either direction) some simple minded folk will find that their sensibilities have been offended. The best thing you can do if you are one of those people is ask yourself what it is that is bothering you, if being bothered now and again has any worth to you, and finally either embrace the artist and his work or walk the other direction.

About the only sensible complaint regarding these bears is that in essence they are graffiti, which in my opinion is not really sensible because I gain utility in the form of psychic benefits from almost all the graffiti art I see. One of my favorite graffiti artists is Banksey, and you can find his work here: http://www.banksy.co.uk/

Honestly, if you are offended by teddy bears poking fun at humanities hardships, well... you need to lighten up imo.