Dan Park

Dan Park (born May 4, 1968)[1] is a Swedish street artist who has been arrested, fined, and sentenced to jail for hate speech in Swedish Courts several times for his art.

Not to be confused with Dan Parks.

Controversies and convictions

In 2009 Parks was on trial for placing swastikas and boxes labeled "Zyklon B" in front of a Jewish community center.[2]

In 2011, Park was arrested for a collage poster depicting an Afro-Swede[3] student activist naked and in chains along with text saying "Our negro slave has run away", and the activist's personal contact information. Park singled out the student activist for reporting a student party with people in blackface. Park was convicted of defamation and racial agitation, and given a suspended sentence, fined, and ordered to pay damages.[4]

In 2014, Park was arrested at the opening of an exhibition of his collage posters, and was sentenced to 6 months in jail for incitement to racial agitation and defamation, and ordered to pay a total of 60,000 kronor ($8,700) in damages to four people depicted in his pictures.[5] Additionally, the court ordered 9 of his works destroyed.[6]

In 2018 Park was sentenced to three months jail for using publicly using racial slurs on social media and alleging rape culture was common among immigrants. The judges dismissed his claim someone else used his social media account without his knowledge as "far-fetched".[7] The sentence was later increased to four months by an appeals court.[8]

Park has associated himself with the far-right Pegida movement and Swedish neo-nazi groups, denied the Holocaust and expressed support for the Norwegian terrorist and mass-murderer Anders Breivik.[9]

Critical reception

Park himself insists that his works are not racist, but a satiric commentary on current events and against political correctness in Sweden. Park is mainly notable for the intense public debate about freedom of speech that his case and works have generated, especially in Denmark, where his works have been exhibited in the Parliament building.[10]

In an opinion published by The National Organization of Artists (Konstnärernas Riksorganisation), Swedish art critic Robert Stasinski does not believe Park's images can qualify as art as it is not possible to defend that ″they are open to multiple possibilities of interpretation" and neither Park nor his exhibitors have tried to give the images any broader artistic context. He concludes that that is "not a sign that Dan Park is a bad or undeveloped artist, it is probably a sign that he never wanted to be one."[11]

Artist Lars Vilks, who created controversy with his drawings of Mohammed, calls Parks a defender of the freedom of expression.[2]

Art journalist Øyvind Strømmen said that Park's street art often conveys a message of far-right extremism and that Parks is at best a poser and provocateur, but likely worse than that.[2]

References
  1. "Birth data from Ratsit.se".
  2. [https://kunstkritikk.no/dan-park-debatt-brer-seg-i-norden/ Dan Park-debatt brer seg i Norden]. Nordisk kunsttidsskrift =ct 23rd 2014
  3. "Swedish artist jailed for 'race hate'". The Local.
  4. "Artist avoids jail for 'negro slave taunt'". The Local.
  5. "Swedish artist jailed for 'race hate' pictures". The Local. 2014-08-21. Retrieved 2014-11-05.
  6. "Sentenced: Swedish Artist Dan Park "Incited Against an Ethnic Group"".
  7. 'Malmö 'street artist' Dan Park jailed again for hate crimes'. The Local, Nov 9th 2019
  8. 'Malmö street artist given extra month in jail for hate crimes'. The Local, Apr 26th 2019
  9. 'Här är rasismen bakom svenska Pegida'. Expo, Apr 4th 2105
  10. "Dan Parks forbudte billeder vises på Christiansborg i dag". Politiken.
  11. Robert Stasinski: 'Fallet Dan Park'. Konstnärernas Riksorganisation


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