Bezanson on Performance Art

Randall P. Bezanson, University of Iowa College of Law, has published "Performing Art,", in a modified version in the forthcoming Art and Freedom of Speech (University of Illinois Press, 2008), in the Federal Communications Law Journal (April 2008), and as University of Iowa Legal Studies Research Paper 05-08. Here is the abstract.

In this modified version of a chapter in his forthcoming book, Art and Freedom of Speech, (Univ. of Illinois Press, 2008-09), Professor Bezanson begins to probe the nature of art and its relation to the first amendment free speech guarantee. The article, to appear in the Federal Communication Law Journal, uses the Karen Finley v. NEA case, and specifically discussion of Finley's performance art, to critique the Supreme Court's very approach to the Finley case and to view the issues from the perspective of art, artistic freedom, and the Supreme Court's role in fashioning constitutional protection for art as art, and not simply as cognitive speech.

Download it from SSRN here.