LD50 – Free Expression Or Racist Hate?

 Introduction

LD50 is a privately owned art gallery run by Lucia Diego in London. The gallery became a major news item last year for for hosting a conference called Neoreaction, with speakers including white supremacist Brett Stevens, whose works inspired killer Anders Breivik, a fact of which he appears proud. Antifascist groups are planning to protest against the gallery on Saturday 25th Feb.

In an opinion piece in the Guardian yesterday Jonathan Jones argued compellingly that the gallery should not be forced to close, and that censoring the alt-right artists was the wrong stance to take. He was, I think, making this judgement based on the idea that the gallery was merely an outlet for free expression. The fact is though that the owners of the gallery have a long standing connection with racism, anti-semitism and scorn for social justice.

On their own website and Facebook page they link to their Twitter account, which rather gives the game away. Here we have a selection of their opinions, freely shared:

Antisemitism

https://twitter.com/kantbot2000/status/647579296819752960

https://twitter.com/kantbot2000/status/783801514116714496

Islamophobia

https://twitter.com/kantbot2000/status/804467563228905473

https://twitter.com/kantbot2000/status/734379818733686785

Racism

https://twitter.com/kantbot2000/status/727553280818163713

https://twitter.com/kantbot2000/status/566751123575672832

Fascism

https://twitter.com/kantbot2000/status/550391500702777344

As can be seen from these unpleasant tweets, the owners of LD50 are not simply providing an outlet for neo-nazi (sorry, “alt-right”) propaganda, they are actively endorsing it.

Image by Linda Nylind for the Guardian