Yesterday, I wrote about a proposal being pulled to put a mural in downtown Bismarck of 17-year-old climate activist Greta Thunberg. Local wet plate artist Shane Balkowitsch had submitted the idea to the Renaissance Zone Authority. The mural would have featured a portrait done by Balkowitsch when Thunberg visited Standing Rock last year.
Initially, it seemed the mural may become a reality. But after threats of boycotts, it quickly became apparent that downtown Bismarck wasn’t the place to honor the leftist icon.
As it turns out, Greta Thunberg may be far from the only controversial piece that Balkowitsch has done. As you can see by viewing his online archives, there’s a number of wet plate images that cause one to question what it is he’s is trying to accomplish?
For example, consider the 2017 image portraying Jesus— titled “Temptationis Oblitus” (Latin for “Testing Forgot”). It doesn’t exactly come across as pro-Christian to me. But I’ll let you draw your own conclusions.
This image is all the more confusing when we consider the one in which he does a 2015 portrait of University of Mary President, Monsignor James P. Shea. Why, on the one hand, would Balkowitsch make a mockery of the Son of God, while doing a wet plate of a Catholic priest on the other? How does that make any sense?
Then there’s the 2017 image portraying Donald Trump as some sort of transgender-like figure. It’s titled, “Donald Trump – ‘POTUS Revealed'”.
While it’s no surprise that a leftist like Balkowitsch — who’s “against fracking, against oil” and wants to “immortalize” Thunberg — would mock Trump, isn’t the portrayal of him as a transgender with a Hitler mustache offensive to the LGBTQ community?
But hey, I don’t pretend to understand art— especially this kind.
(Photo Credit: Shane Balkowitsch — Censored for Publication)
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Sources:
- https://theminutemanblog.com/2020/02/12/idea-for-greta-thunberg-mural-in-downtown-bismarck-scrapped/
- http://sharoncol.balkowitsch.com/wetplate.htm
- https://www.umary.edu/about/office-of-president/monsignor-shea.php