One year after taken RCTV from the air waves, the chavista censors have found a way to silence Globovison. Or at least dull considerably their ability to expose the misdeeds of the government: from now on any second lifted from the open broadcast transmission of VTV will be charged at the exorbitant rate of 56 USD. That is, every 30 second that is used by Globovision (and others, cable or open air signal, it does not matter as Globovision is the real target) will cost 1674 USD. And this payable every time it is retransmitted. The memorandum sent by VTV director, ineffable Yuri Pimentel, is worthy of detailed scrutiny as it reveals the clear censorship intentions of the government through VTV.

The first paragraph is a masterpiece of arrogance.

VTV [the state TV, the 24/24 pro chavez propaganda channel at tax payer expense] in defense of its property and its most important asset, which is the the signal that they emit daily to 90% of the national territory; considering that it witness daily the indiscriminate use of its broadcast, through retransmission, by private broadcaster for commercial aims and other, has decided to establish the following payment schedule.

So here we are, the state TV who serves only Chavez, who rarely if ever allows any opposition view inside, will also charge for its broadcast. This would sound pretty reasonable IF THERE WERE another open air broadcast, paid by tax payer, that has 90% coverage of the country and where the political opposition would have, said, at least 40% of air time. IT DOES NOT. The TV stations that air opposition point of views are only private and are limited to regional transmission or to cable. That is the case of RCTV who covered 90% of the country and who now is limited to the 28% homes share of the cable. That is the case of Globovision who fares somewhat better as it also operates with an open signal Caracas and Valencia which roughly gives it a 40% national reach. That is the case of any local TV who individually reach at the very most a 10-15% of the population of Venezuela.

Some of you would said still at this point, "so what?". Let me first point out that a self styled socialist government suddenly considers as private property what belongs to ALL Venezuelans. Indeed, the vary same slogan of VTV is "el canal de todos los Venezolanos" stressing on the 'todos', the networks of ALL Venezuelans. As thus any Venezuelan should be able to use its transmissions since we all pay for them with our taxes, INCLUDING private media broadcasters. But let's move beyond this primal contradiction of the sick mind of Pimentel and those who ordered him to do that (I do not think that he is intelligent enough to come up with this strategy, though he is vicious enough).

If you still find nothing really wrong with that, which by now should mean that you are either a Chavez supporter or simply do not follow regularly how the news are broadcast INSIDE Venezuela, let me explain to you who the real target of this measure is.

RCTV was closed one year ago in what was perhaps the greatest political error of chavismo, even including the FARC recognition. Yet, in spite of this, RCTV through cable managed to gain the highest morning ratings with the talk show La Entrevista, which uses a lot of VTV footage to examine and criticize governmental actions. In the afternoon, in spite of all sorts of attempt, Alo Ciudadano reigns over the ratings from 5 to 8 PM at Globovision, not to mention Grado 33 from 8 to 8:30 PM. Neither VTV nor the neutralized Venevision and Televen have been able to do anything about this as even chavistas watch these spaces.

And why folks watch these spaces? Because VTV only offers propaganda, because the other private networks offer nothing and because through snippets taken from VTV Globovision and RCTV expose the mediocrity and failures and contradictions of the chavista regime. That is why there is a surprisingly large number of chavista who watch these networks, because they get the arguments they need for the internal chavista discussions.

But some of you might still not be impressed. After all you could say that Globovision should send its own camera folks to cover what they need and thus create their very own footage. Good, excellent point of course. Except for one thing: Globovision or RCTV are not allowed in most official functions or press conferences of government officials and thus MUST USE the VTV signal as it is most of the time the only source available for the declaration of such and such minister or chavista politician. When was the last time that Chavez gave a real press conference to ALL Venezuelan media? How often have you seen on TV ministers making important declarations ONLY in front of the microphones of RNV or VTV, and in a discrete hallway at that, as a perfect set up to make sure no embarrassing question shall rise?

By forcing Globovision to pay for ANYTHING taken from VTV in fact the government exerts almost direct censorship: the ability of Globovision to transmit information will be considerably limited, serious criticism of governmental measures at Globovision will be blocked as it cannot show the actual facts and thus risks lacking credibility by only "speaking" about things and not "showing" things, a crucial element in this media era. And the case for other services is even worse: Globovision could still afford the occasional snippet when it is really, really important, but local providers and RCTV simply cannot afford the fees of VTV as too much of their meager advertisement income would be swallowed (RCTV had to reduce its staff by 50% and one year after is still fighting to avoid outright bankruptcy). For all practical purposes, if this measures goes into effect, the access to information of the Venezuelan people will be severely damaged as all official information will have to come through the rosy filter of VTV. And let's not forget one additional benefit for VTV: since much less of its stuff can be now shown, since its editorial abuses will be less prone to scrutiny, we can easily imagine that creeps like Mario Silva at La Hojilla will feel even freer to slander opposition figures without these ones having the recourse to defend themselves at the remaining free channels.

Censorship, as simple as that.

Note: as an added insult to injury, VTV states that all all emissions featuring Chavez and official events will be free of charge, and only if these are shown during news hours. HOWEVER, if any editing is done they will be charged. The memo does not precise if simply shortening of a given speech is considered editing.... Since the words of Chavez are sacred, we can expect that even removal or portions will be considered editing.

And of course no word as to VTV paying Globovison or RCTV for all the transmissions that they get from them to show at slander shows such as La Hojilla.

And even less if private networks will be compensated from the loss of revenue from awful cadenas as the one last night.


-The end-

So we have reached a new anniversary of April 11, the one of 2002, remember? I am not going to go into any panegyric of the date. By now it has become a totally ridiculous propaganda opportunity for chavismo. After years of stonewalling justice, of blocking true investigation of the events, Chavez and associates have granted a select amnesty and now feel free from ever digging at the dark secrets of the day, in particular the dark cloud over chavismo actions. Now they can say whatever they want about that fateful week: as long as they are in office the real truth will never be known. The permanent media show, if any. By the way, Geovanny Vasquez left Venezuela yesterday for Panama. Just like that in spite of the huge storm he unleashed early this week. Another case from which we will likely never get the truth, and even less from the dark chavista cloud of the murder of Danilo Anderson.

That is why I think it is a timely coincidence that my piece on the suspension of the Simpsons makes it out today on Index on Censorship. I get top billing right now and here is the link to permanent page. Fitting coincidence, no?


-The end-

This state paid advertisement (tax payer expense for those who do not get it) was published today in page 5 of the El Universal sports section. It reads textually:


There is so much wrong in this add, so much threat that the mind of anyone should reel at the implications. But let's start by the beginning before any one thinks that this blogger is prejudiced: there is indeed freedom of expression in Venezuela, although increasingly threatened and occasionally limited. What is lacking everyday more and more is freedom of expression. And this has been building up for quite a while, with increasing refusal of the state to talk to anyone but "official" media, and effective freedom of information done with when RCTV was closed last June.

First, let's discuss the context of this add. This week end the IAPA/SIP organized its first of two yearly meetings, this one in Caracas. During last year referendum campaign the government tried to put all sorts of obstacles to the meeting been held anywhere in Venezuela. But the SIP said that they would come no matter what and that lodging would be found one way or the other (remember the latest round of governmental pressure over hotels when the Alejandro Sanz concert had to be canceled). So the SIP came and offered Chavez to open the meeting and expose to the SIP his point of view on the whole matter of freedom of expression in Venezuela and elsewhere. Chavez did not show up and did not even had the decency to refuse. No answer, period.

However the government sponsored a "counter meeting" a couple of blocks away from the SIP hotel. It was called "encounter against media terrorism", no irony intended. As it is becoming more and more the case, the effect of this counter meeting was rather negative to the state as it flopped badly. In fact, it more than flopped, something stressed when Marcos Hernandez of Reporteros por la Verdad, was given a right of response at the SIP and showed his low class, his partiality and his incompetence, not to mention the compulsive lies now the everyday talk in chavistadom. He threatened Mr. Natera, director of Correo del Caroni, a much attacked newspaper, with judicial action by accusing him of being a coup monger in front of all the SIP. That Natera was the spokesperson of the Venezuelan press for that meeting exposed clearly to the whole world better than anything else how threatened is now freedom of expression in Venezuela.

Of course, with his very tarnished image of Chavez was certainly not going to take a chair in a room where someone would dare to criticize him. If you look at the purges inside the all but still born PUSV, whomever might criticize Chavez, even behind closed doors, has been shut out of the chavista pseudo political party. These days Chavez has his paid agents to take the heat wherever needed. That the SIP did criticize much more than just Venezuela, the US was one of the targets, did not make a difference: Chavez wants to project an image of being above criticism even though everyday he is more deserving of it. The self righteousness of Chavez, and his thinning skin are everyday more obvious, as much as his bloated physique. however as he keeps insulting the SIP this one says that only Cuba has more limits to freedom of expression than Venezuela in the Americas.

Now to the add published above. It is very simple: it is a direct threat to El Universal as this add implies directly that El Universal of Caracas, the Venezuelan senior paper, is published at the sufferance of the regime. Its objective might have been to criticize the SIP meeting but in fact it achieves (willingly perhaps?) the opposite effect. Did the subconscious of the public official in charge of this add betrayed him/her?

So here we are, with a government that thinks highly of itself by permitting still some papers to publish. And there are some folks that still dare to defend such policies...

By the way, the SIP heard again about abusive cadenas and that about 80% of the Venezuelan air waves are now under direct or indirect control of the state. That is right, about only 20% of the airborne media is still independent. And this quote is worth posting:

"There is a President (Hugo Chávez) who is persistently attacking journalism and harassing and insulting the press. Journalism here is faced with serious restrictions, and when journalism is exercised under serious restrictions there is no press freedom,"

-The end-

Today is Easter and also the end of two weeks away from easily accessible internet. Thus, since it is Easter, and according to my counter most readers have deserted the blog for the week, I decided to restart posting with a piece of good news: evidence that the media communication offensive of Chavez is destined to failure, no matter how many millions he sinks in or how many media he manages to close. He might manage at best to reduce the flow of information that proves the failure of his regime but he will not be able to stop it. The evidence came to me surprisingly examining a set of pictures that I took at day break on my way to the airport for Mexico. Taking advantage of my new zoom lens I wanted to picture the huge slums that are on the Planicie Tunnel, to show how little things have changed after 9 years of chavismo.


From this picture it is clear that this chavista hardcore electorate area has not had much improvement in its day to day life. Perhaps a few Barrio Adentro modules that allow for free aspirin and cough syrup, but the trudge up and down the hill is still the same, the water supply problem is still the same, the food supply problem is still the same and we can guess that from the closeness the crowding and personal security problem are still the same. I am optimist, I wrote "still the same" when in fact it might have gotten worse, for example when people must walk twice as much for a single kilo of essential powder milk.

But if the above picture speaks for itself as to chavismo overall failure, another one gave me quite an hindsight as to how fed up people are with Chavez cadenas.

In this image where I was trying to illustrate from closer the living conditions, the first thing that struck me was the amount of satellite TV dishes, Venezuelan Direct TV. After all the precarious existence of the dwellers is obvious, again after 9 years of chavismo. What is less obvious is the amount of satellite dishes, something that did not exist there 9 years ago. How come at the very least 10-20% (I was able to distinguish 24 dishes, marked with a pink dot next to them) of these homes are paying the most expensive cable system in Venezuela? Click to enlarge and to see if you can find more dishes than I did.

On the practical part, land line cable is simple very difficult to set up in such areas. Besides investment cannot be recouped for the very simple reason that illegal connection will bloom as soon as a network is set up. Chavismo has been terribly lax with property, material or intellectual, and cable systems are simply defenseless against piracy in Venezuela. Thus the inhabitants have only two options: Direct TV of free open broadcast signal.

Unfortunately open broadcast is less and less of an option. RCTV was closed last year and as such it created a major "entertainment" problem in that it was a major source of soap operas. These days the major news network Globovision is under serious threat of been closed in turn. But the other two private networks have censored themselves a lot on the news front and have not been able to step in to replace RCTV in entertainment as people simply resent the fact that they have no more choice between soaps: there is only the Venevision soaps, the Brazilian soaps of Televen and that is that.

But the key factor here is the constant intromission of the government in the broadcast system. First there is the "cadena" problem where the government hijacks ALL TV and RADIO signal SIMULTANEOUSLY for AS LONG AS IT WISHES to pass any propaganda or speech of Chavez. These can last several hours and that night, well, there is nothing on TV but the same vociferating Chavez in any dial number. If that was not bad enough, the government has barred new private networks to emerge while it has increased the state owned networks. From the original VTV in in 1998, now we have also ViVe and ANTV, Tves upon the ruins of RCTV, and in Caracas Avila TV, the nationalization of one small operator into Telesur, and some other local stuff, plus some private but cryptic pro Chavez such as Canal i. In other words, as the private sector is squeezed out of media, the state increase its presence with mostly propaganda, political programming and lousy entertainment.

So what is the harassed worker to do, the worker who had to leave the hight of his hill before day break and who probably returns past sunset to his home? He wants entertainment, mindless or not, and VTV will not give it. Thus he needs to scrap all the money he can to get a satellite dish.

Now this is very bad news for Chavez because banning for example Globovision from open air broadcast in Caracas will not work. First, if the closing RCTV was a PR disaster, the closing of Globovision will be the official end of freedom of expression in Venezuela. The national and international consequences this time will not be as easily avoided.

But second and more important, hiding information that exposes the badly manged country will not be possible. While I was away we had the fabulous border concert organized by Juanes for peace in Latin America. Well, if you looked at any of the state media listed above you would had never known that such a concert took place, and even less of its success. Unfortunately for Chavez such news reaches the population. So, even for those who do not have access to Direct TV, those who cannot afford it, they will still manage to know those who have access to Direct TV and in time of trouble will ask them what is really going on, or bring a six pack of beer to split with the dish owner at news time. With only 10% of barrios already having a satellite dish, news cannot be hidden anymore, CNN is not subjected to cadena, RCTV neither and if Globovision is kicked out of open air broadcast it will also be exempt from following cadenas. Only open signal networks are subject to cadenas. Paradoxically information might circulate better, have more impact as even hardcore chavistas will start to suspect that government is really trying to hide stuff.

No matter what minister Izarra is saying trying to justify his job to Chavez, chavismo will either fail or will be forced into suppression of freedom of expression.

-The end-

Virginia Rutledge is an art historian and vice president and general counsel of the nonprofit organization Creative Commons. Prior to joining Creative Commons, she was a litigator at Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP, where her practice included intellectual property, art and entertainment law. She possesses a rare understanding of art and all things IP, and we've covered some of the terrific events she's organized in these pages. Her recent column in Artforum, reproduced in its entirety below, is the article I've read that cuts to the heart of what happened and what actually is at stake in the sticky mess between Christoph Büchel and MassMOCA.

via Artforum (March 2008) :

Exterior of the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art during the installation of the unfinished work Training Ground for Democracy by Christoph Büchel, North Adams, 2006. Photo: John Carli.

Institutional Critique

AT FIRST, IT LOOKED LIKE a terrific match. Swiss installation artist Christoph Büchel and Joseph Thompson, director of the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, had planned great things for Mass MoCA's vast Building 5, one of the world’s largest exhibition spaces for contemporary art. Büchel had conceived an artwork whose physical scale was in keeping with its imposing subject--loosely speaking, ideological warfare. Thompson was to deliver the tons (approximately 150) of material necessary to realize Büchel's vision, which included an entire disused cinema, a dive bar, a two-story Cape Cod home, and a reconstruction of one of the mock villages used by the US military to train troops destined for Iraq. Titled Training Ground for Democracy, the installation was first scheduled to open to the public in December 2006.

Unfortunately, the relationship between artist and museum soured soon after it began. Money was a big problem. The shopping was epic and way over budget, but Mass MoCA still couldn’t make Büchel happy. December passed, and Büchel refused to continue work on the project or to allow it to be shown. Curator Nato Thompson (no relation to Joseph), who brought the project to Mass MoCA, couldn’t keep the two together. Eventually, on May 22, 2007, the museum canceled the show.

This is not the first time that an art project has failed to come to fruition, or that an artist and would-be collaborator have found themselves at odds. But this was a spectacular failure, a debacle that ended in a lawsuit that pitted artist against institution in an unprecedented way. Shortly before canceling the exhibition, Mass MoCA asked the District Court of Massachusetts to declare that the museum was legally entitled to display Büchel's unfinished work. A few days later, it opened "Made at Mass MoCA," an exhibition intended to showcase its collaborative work with artists, with Büchel's unfinished work, mostly but not entirely obscured by tarps, on view, along with documentation relating to the project. The work had already been seen in progress and unshrouded by numerous visitors, and apparently it was Büchel's objection to this, and to certain aspects of Mass MoCA's work on the installation, that prompted the museum to launch defensive litigation—the first time a US art institution has ever sought legal sanction to present work against an artist's will. If Mass MoCA acted out of a siege mentality, it’s not difficult to understand why: Its prime gallery space had been held hostage for months. At one point the museum even went so far as to consider completing the installation itself for what would have been, in production manager Dante Birch's words, a "Mass MoCA interprets Büchel" show. Nevertheless, the lawsuit was an aggressive move. In response, Büchel argued that Mass MoCA had violated his right to control the work and its presentation and that his reputation had been harmed as a result, claims he based on his legal rights under copyright and the "moral rights" available under the Visual Artists Rights Act of 1990 (VARA), a limited extension of federal copyright law.

In the wake of appropriation art’s trials in the courts (most visibly featuring Jeff Koons, who famously lost one and recently won one), and as art licensing has become a profitable revenue stream for many artists (or, typically, their estates), copyright is a more familiar term than it used to be in the art world, even if its technicalities remain, well, technical. Yet a significant amount of art-world comment on Mass MoCA v. Büchel reveals some persistent misunderstandings about the difference between copyright and moral rights—and there is a significant difference, at least in the US. Put simply, the US Copyright Act protects the exclusive right (with some limitations) of the author of any creative work, visual or otherwise, to control the ability to copy, reproduce, distribute, display, or perform the work, or to make a derivative work. Moral rights, by contrast, which include rights protecting authors against the misattribution or unauthorized alteration of their work, are still largely foreign to US law, something that may well surprise creators, such as Büchel, raised under the European copyright regime. In passing VARA Congress specifically granted makers of only certain types of visual art some rights not available under US copyright generally (and thus not available to authors of texts, for example). These include the right to proper attribution; the right to prevent any intentional distortion, mutilation, or other modification of a work that would be prejudicial to the artist’s "honor or reputation"; and the right to prevent any destruction of a work of "recognized stature."

Because VARA had not been much tested in the courts, the biggest unsettled legal issue in the case seemed to many commentators to be whether VARA would apply to an unfinished work of art, as distinct from a preparatory work or a completed element of a larger work. It's an interesting question for law geeks, because copyright undoubtedly protects a draft of a work, as long as the draft is in a fixed, tangible form of expression--all hundred starts of your great American novel are protected, so long as they're not only in your head. Stand-alone parts of a work in progress are also protected. Each Burgher of Calais, whether created in Europe or America, would be entitled to an individual copyright. Büchel's argument that VARA should apply to his incomplete work was, however, thought by many to be a close call at best. With installation art in particular, where there is a definite whole in mind, it makes little sense to think of each phase of the assembly process, much less each object used in the installation, as independently copyrightable, which would be a prerequisite for affording the unfinished work the additional rights applicable under VARA.

The focus on VARA in fact tended to obscure the more fundamental copyright question here, which is perhaps ultimately of greater interest. Almost a century after the first readymade, the intellectual-property status of such work remains unclear. While one can have a copyright for an arrangement of objects, an artist who looks to the law to protect her interest in a plumbing fixture purchased from Home Depot and displayed in the context of an art fair will look in vain. Although the art world recognizes readymades as art, the law has not done so. Under existing interpretations of the law, only after sufficient "rectification," to use Duchamp's terminology, could a readymade become original enough for copyright to attach. One of the key takeaways here is that copyright and art simply don’t line up.

Christoph Büchel, Training Ground for Training Ground for Democracy, 2007, mixed media. Installation view, Art Basel Miami Beach. Photo: Christoph Büchel.

Does it matter? Yes: When an art institution can use copyright to argue against art, that’s something to think about. One of the few aspects of this case that has not received enough attention is Mass MoCA’s astonishing and troubling arguments regarding the status of Büchel's work as art. Lawyers frequently argue “in the alternative” when there is more than one viable legal theory that fits the facts; there’s nothing objectionable about that. But in addition to disputing the applicability of VARA to an unfinished work, Mass MoCA made two mutually exclusive arguments, each of which denied the validity of Büchel’s work. First, the museum argued that "the materials...do not contain sufficient original expression on the part of Büchel to be protected under the Copyright Act." Second, it argued that because of the collaborative nature of the project, Mass MoCA was a "joint owner of any copyright" in the work. Talk about love scorned: This kind of insult cannot easily be taken back (though the museum has tried).

The museum may well have been legally correct as regards the copyright status of most of the materials assembled for Training Ground. But that’s not the point: Prior to the litigation, no one at the institution asserted that Büchel’s work was not "art"; indeed, Büchel's lawyers produced evidence that the museum had promoted the unfinished work as a significant example of contemporary art as they invited critics (and potential donors) to come and see it. As for the joint-authorship argument, the notion offends the common art-world understanding of what it means when an institution offers to collaborate with an artist. Büchel put it succinctly in one of his final e-mails to Joseph Thompson when he asked: "Did you ever realize that your institution and your job is based on art production and that you destroy the condition of its existence, the artwork and artist concept, by doing all this?"

That's a bit dramatic, it has to be said. It may be true that, as Mass MoCA curator Susan Cross asserted in a January 2007 e-mail to Joe Thompson, “[t]he single author/artist idea is such an outdated notion, really. Artmaking is much more collaborative these days,” but if either of Mass MoCA's arguments had held sway with the court, the implications for future collaborations between other institutions and artists would have been serious. Though one senses the possibility for just such experiments in authorship growing all the time (avant-garde imperative or genuine social shift, who can say), recognition of artistic autonomy is the moral contract that Büchel and those who took his side in this matter so clearly felt was betrayed. But there’s an easy fix known to artists and their patrons for centuries: the contract. As it happened, the absence of a contract between Mass MoCA and Büchel was the thing that Judge Michael A. Ponsor, who ruled on the case, found more significant—and exasperating—than anything else. The failure of the parties to put their agreement to do the project into writing is particularly perplexing because contracts for big-budget and/or high-profile art projects are the norm at art institutions all around the globe. Joseph Thompson has been quoted as saying, “I don’t think a contract would have made any difference at all in this case,” and he told the Wall Street Journal Online that he does not intend to change his institution’s practice of avoiding formal contracts with artists, relying instead on “good will.” To be sure, prenups were once viewed as a corruption of the very ideals that ground marriage, and they obviously don’t guarantee a successful one. A good prenup, however, does provide an opportunity to uncover misplaced desires and misaligned ambitions.

As it turned out, on September 21, 2007, Judge Ponsor ruled that neither copyright nor VARA applied to this particular set of circumstances, in which the artist had forsworn the work and the collaborator had paid most of the bills. VARA’s application to unfinished works was thus left to be resolved another day. The judge also ruled that there was nothing to prevent Mass MoCA from exhibiting the materials assembled for the work, but made this ruling contingent on the exhibit’s being accompanied by a disclaimer explaining that it was an unfinished project that did not carry out the artist’s original intent. So Mass MoCA “won,” pending the artist’s planned appeal. Nevertheless, presumably realizing it had proceeded far enough down the path of undermining its own credibility, the museum began to dismantle the work almost immediately after the ruling. At least it’s not all landfill: Some of the smaller elements resurfaced in an installation Büchel showed this past December in Hauser & Wirth’s booth at Art Basel Miami Beach. Somewhat ironically, at the Maccarone gallery booth at the same fair, a selection of the artist’s e-mail correspondence with Mass MoCA served as a reminder of some necessary restraints on copyright. In presenting Mass MoCA’s copyrighted material (the e-mails), the artist relied on First Amendment and fair-use rights—over the museum’s objections, which were, quite rightly, overturned in court in a separate proceeding last August.

Meanwhile, this very public divorce has highlighted the disparity between the authorship and artistic rights protected by law and the deference to aesthetic autonomy and the artist’s vision often presumed to be operative in the art world. It also highlights the reality that the contemporary art patronage system is rather more complicated than selling the Pope on a grand idea. The Mass MoCA–Büchel partnership included lots of expected advantages for all involved. The problem was that no one was clear on who paid the bills, and who took out the trash. (Joe to Christoph, early in the project: “I’m terrified about the costs, by the way. So far, we have zero in sponsorships, nada, . . . if you have any ideas for that, let me know, as I really have to get to work on that right away,” Christoph to Joe, toward its end: “The artist will not accept any orders and any more pressure or compromises as to how things have to be done from the museum director or museum’s technicians. The artist demands full autonomy with regard to his artwork.”)

The major lesson of the case, then, is not that the scope of VARA needs to be clarified or possibly enlarged. The truly challenging questions here are the ones about values: What power should artists have to control the presentation and disposition of their work, and what obligations are appropriate to impose? What are the responsibilities of art institutions to protect individual artistic vision while also maintaining their own cultural authority? And most importantly, who decides? Judge Ponsor made his opinion on this point very clear when he observed: “This controversy doesn’t belong here. This is a passionate disagreement about aesthetic ideology and the rights of an artist and the process of creation that is extremely ill-suited to the courtroom.” In other words, the judge advises, work your issues out—at home.

Virginia Rutledge is an art historian and vice president and general counsel of the nonprofit organization Creative Commons.

Poor Chavez, since his august 15 2007 announcement for a referendum cum power grab, things have been going downhill for him. First, the campaign sucked. Second, milk, sugar, flour, beans, etc... started missing on the shelves. Then he lost the vote on December 2 and ended up making a ridiculous spectacle of his bitter self. Moving on late December he botched a hostage "rescue" show. When he got them finally in early January he had no better idea than to endorse the FARC and blow away any points he might have won though the hostage release. Since then he kept running into more trouble such as the Exxon scandal where the ineptitude of the "people"'s PDVSA is now the laughing stock of the world.

But things can always get worse. Now an old censorship issue came back to visit him: the Spanish singer Alejandro Sanz (one of my favorites by the way).

Mr. Sanz had the bad fortune to criticize Chavez polices when he was visiting Venezuela last, around the heydays of the Recall Election. Since then chavismo has been trying to discredit him but it seems that Sanz is winning the party after all. After having refused to rent him the Poliedro for a Caracas concert, the government sort of allowed him to reschedule his concert. But lo' and behold, Sanz canceled it because the logistics were too complicated and no hotel wanted to receive his party. Hotel owners were quick to refute this, as expected, since they know full well that were they to confirm that they discriminated against Sanz for fear of the government, they would have got a visit of the SENIAT within days. Here we know better and if we have a hard time to forgive hotel management at least we do understand that this is the way to survive in a lawless country, and they owe it to their staff stability. Some of us also remember the recent example of the Primero Justicia convention which was postponed because nobody wanted to rent them space until finally the EuroBuilding did.

So Sanz canceled but any mean victory that chavismo would have been celebrating, many are despicable enough to celebrate such things, was quickly undone by a communique where the creme de la creme of the world entertainment and recognized musicians took the side of Sanz. These include more than a hundred folks (so far?):

Top artists such as Shakira, Juan Luis Guerra, Joan Manuel Serrat, and Mark Anthony, along more fluffy but equally well known artist/celebrities such as JeLo and Ricky Martin.

David Beckham: from the sport world but entertainment side, and surprisingly politically aware, a nice change from the Hollywood tasteless crowd that has been hanging around Chavez lately

The list also include many Venezuelan singers of course, the most known ones here but also many musical groups from all around Latin America.

A few days ago I was thinking about the chavista carnival and the poverty of thought and creativity it meant. Well, when you see the roster of the people supporting Sanz agaisnt Chavez you get the best possible confirmation of how low and how discredited Chavez has gone outside of Venezuela, at least among people who have a few functioning neurones.

But that was not all for Chaevz. One of the greatest writers alive in Latin America, Carlos Fuentes, went out again agaisnt Chavez. And the worse part for Chavez is that in the very same interview he praised Castro while trashing Chavez, with some the marvelous expressions, here below:

Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes qualified this past Wednesday president Hugo Chavez of "demagogo lloricón" (crybaby demagogue) without any redeeming traits and he added that he completely dislikes him.

"He almostlost power. He protected himself with the church. He cried. He is a man without substance, a cheap tropical Mussolini. He has matters little."..."Mussolini with bananas. Banana Mussolini (...) He seems to me a demagogue crybaby".

According to Fuentes, the political system of Venezuela is not socialism but fascism.

[he] compared Chavez with Fidel Castro, who he described as "respectable man". "One is genuine the other is a fraud". "One might not agree with Fidel, but he must be respected... The other one is an amateur... that will not last much".

"[It is Chavez] function, his dictatorial pretense, that mania of Latin America dictators, of the authoritarian type, to hide his at home failures creating foreign problems".

"Chavez lives of that, personality cult".

"I think that the great failure of the Bush presidency is that he thought he entered a world he would dominate... and we saw that it was not so" " His project crashed down because today's world does not admit a single power".

Accusing Fuentes of right wing conspiracy, of serving the Empire, well, it will not fly.

For the thinking world, Chavez is a clown, a sad clown at that.


-The end-