In September of 2010, Shorewood’s Atwater Park — a beautiful space situated atop a dramatic bluff overlooking Lake Michigan — received a new resident: Jaume Plensa’s “Spillover II.” The sculpture is composed of steel letters welded together to form the figure of a seated man, his legs pulled toward his body and his arms draped around them. In the daytime, the piece catches the light against the backdrop of an ever-changing, watery canvas, and at night, lights from below transform the sculpture into a kind of alphabetical lighthouse.
Having beautified its surroundings for five years, “Letter Man,” as my family calls it, suddenly got a rude shock in November, when a visitor to the area made a startling allegation: that several words could be found on its back, in close proximity to one another: “DEAD JEW,” “CHEAP JEW,” “FRY BAD JEW.” If true, the implications would be deeply troubling. Our community would have embraced a work harboring secret messages of vicious bigotry, crouching like so many Greek soldiers poised to come charging out of their wooden horse.
As the accusation spread, the typical first reaction here was dismay; could such a lovely sculpture contain such ugly messages? But that quickly gave way to skepticism, after closer scrutiny showed there was no “there” there. Yes, one could clearly see the word “Jew.” But one could form hundreds of other words as well, which is part of the sculpture’s charm, and perhaps part of its idea. But a Z stands between the B and AD, DEA appears without a second D, and the alleged CHEAP, formed by the visitor’s manipulation of the photo he published, is really CHEAD.
That should have ended the matter. Yet a tiny band of the cyber-outraged quickly joined the chorus calling for the statue’s removal, and in some cases actually advocating violence against the artist. And who is the artist? A world-renowned figure famous for creating works of astounding grace and beauty, and consistently articulating, in word and image, his deep love of humanity, his vision of a global community of humankind. It’s not for nothing that he was named a finalist for a major Holocaust memorial in Ohio.
Yet this was the man of whom some were quick to assume the worst, based on the flimsiest of evidence that ran contrary to beliefs and actions established over the course of a life and a career. That is what has pained many of us in the community most. The rabbis of ancient Judaism, 2,000 years before the internet came along, compared defamation to murder, for what is left if one loses one’s good name? Mr. Plensa should never have had his name and the word “anti-Semite” uttered in the same breath.
In Shorewood, I’m pleased to say, this was not the response. My neighbors, some Jewish and some not, have been pained that an artist whose work we feel proud to have in our midst has been unfairly tarnished—though, we feel confident, only momentarily. True, the artist and his gallery had the statue temporarily removed, and are exploring exactly how best to demonstrate his firm commitment to the values his work has always been built upon. I trust they will soon find a solution that successfully walks the tightrope of putting to rest any reasonable person’s lingering concerns, while not having baseless charges hijack a beloved work of public art. The best way to avoid this, in my view and that of many of my neighbors, is to restore “Letter Man” to his seat of honor overlooking the lake.
Joel Berkowitz is director of the Sam & Helen Stahl Center for Jewish Studies and a professor in the Department of Foreign Languages and Literature at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
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