December 17 – Less than three weeks after Serie A clubs in Italy pledged collectively to combat the “serious problem” of racism, further criticism has rained down from anti-discriminatory bodies following a totally ill-judged campaign featuring paintings of apes.
With the Italian game blighted by monkey chants, there has been widespread bewilderment over three paintings by artist Simone Fugazzotto, who says he created the images to “change people’s perceptions” after being commissioned by Serie A.
The league said in a statement that the intention is to “spread the values of integration, multiculturalism and brotherhood” and that the paintings will be on permanent display at the entrance to the Serie A headquarters in Milan.
But AC Milan and Roma have already condemned the move.
“We understand the league wants to tackle racism but we don’t believe this is the right way to do it,” said a Roma statement.
AC Milan said they were “surprised by the total lack of consultation” over the artwork and added: “Art can be powerful, but we strongly disagree with the use of monkeys as images in the fight against racism and were surprised by the total lack of consultation.”
Fugazzotto argued that he “tried to show that we are all complex and fascinating creatures, who can be sad or happy, Catholic, Muslim or Buddhist, but at the end of the day, what decides who we are is not the colour of our skin.
“I only paint monkeys as a metaphor for human beings. We turn the concept back on the racists, as we are all monkeys originally. So I painted a Western monkey, an Asian monkey and a black monkey.”
But Olivier Bernard, a member of Show Racism the Red Card, said the images were a sign of “a lack of education” while anti-discriminatory body Fare said it was left “speechless” and the campaign looked like a “sick joke” and Kick It Out added the use of monkeys was “completely inappropriate”.
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