Simon Burgess, a lecturer at East Surrey College, is facing serious
disciplinary action (and possible redundancy) for introducing students
to the work of photographic artist Del LaGrace Volcano.
Management are claiming it is pornography, salacious, grotesque,
worthless and not relevant to, or appropriate for 2nd year level 3
photography students preparing for higher study.
Apart from being censorious, backward, and homophobic, management's
stance displays a remarkable ignorance of contemporary debates and
image-making strategies. This is a serious matter that has
implications
for all academics, teachers, and students, and we would be very
grateful
for an email expressing your support for Simon, and offering your
expert
opinion on the relevance of Del's work to contemporary debates and
practices, his status as an international transgender artist, etc.
All emails should be sent to Eugenie Shinkle (shinkle@wmin.ac.uk), and
she will forward them on to the appropriate person. We're under a bit of time pressure as his hearing has
been
scheduled for August 17th.