On art, children and scandal

Before I dive into the maelstrom of the Melbourne Festival, which opens tonight, I thought I'd briefly revisit the latest Henson fracas, which boiled over after extracts from David Marr's new book, The Henson Case, were published in the Fairfax Press last week. In a pattern that has become depressingly familiar, politicians scrambled over each other to find appropriate adjectives with which to express their disgust and revulsion and the msm hacks went thermonuclear, behaving exactly as if a known paedophile was permitted to enter a primary school and let loose among defenceless children. And yet any sober assessment of the facts shows there is absolutely no suggestion that Henson or the principal concerned behaved with anything less than propriety.

How is it that an internationally acclaimed photographer, who has been making his art for 35 years without a whisper of complaint from any of his collaborators, has become the local equivalent of Gary Glitter? The mere mention of Henson in some quarters now means "paedophile" and "kiddie porn". And yet - even under the glare of this hostile publicity - the images he makes have been passed by authorities as suitable for general viewing. At worst, PG. At the height of the first controversy, when you would have thought that, if there were any basis to the accusations made against him, aggrieved models would have been coming out of the woodwork, the only ones who went public did so to defend Henson's practice.

The new media frenzy has sparked an inquiry into the principal concerned, Sue Knight, who invited Henson to the school, St Kilda Park Primary School, last year to scout for models. While the principal concerned has been properly discreet, refusing to pre-empt the findings of an inquiry while projecting an air of quiet confidence that she breached no protocols, Premier John Brumby has had no such qualms, telling the media that she had behaved "inappropriately".

There is much talk about protecting the innocence of children and "community standards". There is endless discussion about how the "arts community" is "out of touch". The few politicians - both, sadly for those who believe in the Right/Left dichotomy, Liberal pollies - who have stood up for Henson have been howled down and mocked in what is a startling example of cynical political opportunism by Labor. But what of those at the centre of this toxic scandal?

The parents and school council at St Kilda Park Primary have come out aggressively in defence of their principal. Parents have complained that fighting through a media scrum to get their kids to school has been a far worse invasion of their privacy than any visit by Henson. The Grade 6 children sent a letter to the Age today defending their former principal. Industry professionals, from Olympians to Oscar-winning actors, have said again and again that scouting for talent in schools is standard practice which, even if it's news to almost everyone else, has been going on for years.

As with the models who defended Henson's ethics and behaviour, the evidence of those who might be said to be best informed about the issue seems to count for nothing. Henson photographs nudes, so he is abusing children. The equation is unshakeable. His reputation can therefore be dragged through the mud with impunity, even though there has never been a complaint of abuse against him, and even though the authorites concerned have - unambiguously and despite huge political and media pressure - agreed that he has never broken the law.

It's one of the most unpleasant and unjust spectacles I have witnessed for years, and is only the most public aspect of a general clamp-down on the arts, fuelled by an arts-hostile media. The arts do good scandal, as can be seen by the headlines generated by a hapless Fringe show this week, whose bad taste title hit the current affairs shows. The message is clear: the arts are offensive. The arts should not be allowed.

Perhaps what is most depressing is that those who argue in defence of Henson, myself included, have said from the beginning - despite constant claims to the contrary - that there is a need for public debate on the issues that have inflamed the Henson controversy. We have acknowledged the public anxiety and genuine concerns about child protection. Many of us have children of our own, and feel those same anxieties and concerns. We just think that debate ought to be based on facts, not hysterical supposition and the fevered imaginations of shockjocks.

Despite this, "Henson apologists" have been painted as people who support paedophilia and ride roughshot over the "rights of children", when we are simply pointing out that Henson has not, and has never had, a case to answer. Every investigation has found that he is innocent of the loathsome accusations made against him. The sober and fair-minded analysis of Marr's book has been overwhelmed by the media frenzy, when there has never been more need for it. What we have been watching is not a public debate, but a public lynching.