Lesbian Artist Charges Censorship Over Gallery Reaction to Her Work

Lesbian artist Liza Svika sees her colorful acrylic paintings of playful women in love as a bold step forward for a good cause: portraying women in roles of passion and power usually reserved for men.

But several other artists whose works are also displayed at the Offtrack Gallery in Encinitas say Svika’s work borders on the pornographic, and has chased customers from the artists’ cooperative and upstairs coffee shop in a renovated train station along Old Highway 101.

Now Svika says her fellow artists have restricted which of her paintings can be shown in the tiny space, requiring that all female figures be clothed and that the paintings contain no explicit sexual content.

The 30-year-old Svika says she is being censored by an unlikely source: fellow female artists who are ignoring her right to freedom of speech.

“This whole thing has shocked me,” Svika said. “It’s not like you’ve got a bunch of 90-year-old grandmothers who don’t know anything about art. These are all artists here--women artists.

“And they’re censoring me as a lesbian artist. There’s nothing obscene or dirty with any of this work. These people are just homophobic,” she said.

Fellow artists say they knew of Svika’s sexual preferences last May when they reviewed her portfolio and admitted her into the eight-artist cooperative, which shares expenses and a 10% commission on works sold.

Recently, however, they said in interviews, her work has become more explicit and offensive.

Debate began in February when Svika’s work was displayed on a prominent wall of the gallery as featured artist of the month. Several new works produced for that show pushed several of the other artists over the edge.

They called an emergency meeting a week after the showing began and asked Svika to remove her paintings. Svika, in turn, hired a lawyer and threatened to sue the gallery over breach of contract.

The artists relented, but later decided to keep a tighter rein on the type of work Svika was bringing to the gallery. She now has five paintings hanging there; six others have been banned, Svika said.

“Liza’s work has just gotten bolder and bolder,” said Patricia Hildebrand, a producer of stained-glass creations and one of two artists to pull their work from the gallery for the month of February in protest of Svika’s work.

“She has exposed parts of the female anatomy not seen even in so-called nude art,” Hildebrand said. “But it’s not just the nudity, it’s what these women are doing in the paintings. I can honestly say they offended me. And they’re just not appropriate for the general public.”

But John von Passenheim, Svika’s attorney, says she is a victim of censorship: “People deciding on the merits of a work by its erotic content--how can you come up with any other name for it?”

Svika says her art is influenced by age-old Japanese Kabuki street-performer figures and by American comic strip characters. Her often semi-nude women wear colorful masks and have pierced nipples. Throughout, they are portrayed in playful romps with each other and with mythical dragons.

One controversial work, titled “Kabuki Reflection,” speaks for itself. “It’s pretty darn obvious,” said the San Diego artist, whose work has also been shown in Palm Springs and Los Angeles. “It’s two women lying on top of each other in a sexual pose.”

Another, titled “Tickle My Fancy,” shows a woman hovering over a companion in sheer lingerie who is on all fours at her feet.

Another, showing a semi-nude woman suckling a baby dragon, is called “Bedtime Dragon Tales.” Svika says the work is far from obscene and that the idea came from a painting in the Louvre in Paris, showing the mythical characters Romulus and Remus being suckled by a she-wolf.

“My work is very playful and political,” Svika said. “I take a very strong feminist stance in putting women on an equal level in society. My women are very strong and very sexual, and they don’t have to be ashamed of it. They’re just having fun.

“In most of my work, women are just fooling around. But people get upset because there’s two women being portrayed. If there were men in these same positions, I don’t think these people would have any complaint with my work.”

One work that particularly incensed fellow artists, Svika said, is titled “Come Play With Me” and shows a semi-nude woman on a romp with a dragon’s tail.

“Everything these people see is offensive,” she said. “Haven’t you ever laid around on a hot summer’s day--one that’s too hot to put clothes on--and played with your dog? That’s what’s happening here.”

Svika’s fellow artists now require her to have her works screened before they are hung in the gallery--a scrutiny not given any other artist in the co-op, she said.

Eva Beckman, manager of the Pannikin store and coffee shop above the gallery, said the works are simply not appropriate for such a multi-use forum. “Families who took their kids to the restrooms down below shouldn’t have to be subjected to that kind of thing.”

Not all artists in the cooperative are against the works, however.

“Some people really love her work, and others absolutely hate it,” said Ursula Freer, a landscape artist whose work is also featured at Offtrack.

“I’m caught in the middle. I like the work. I don’t think it was rejected for its homosexual overtones but for the sex in general. It’s a bit outrageous for this place.”

Added artist Lorraine Gibb: “I’ve only had one complaint about the work. But I’ll say one thing: It’s certainly brought a lot of people into the gallery.”

Svika says she’s looking for another arena for her paintings and politics.

“You can say that this is the middle-class conservative suburbs, and what did she expect,” Svika said. “I think that’s crazy. There’s lots of gays here--they just don’t have pink dots on their foreheads so you can pick them right out. They’re out there. And they have the right to see this kind of art.”