Judge Forces State to Rehang the Art It Tore Down

A Bogotá judge gave Colombia's Ministry of Culture 48 hours to put back the artworks it ripped off the walls of the Museo Nacional about two weeks ago. César Enrique Osorio, Bogotá's 24th Family Judge, ruled in favor of an action of tutela, an extraordinary judicial remedy to safeguard fundamental rights, brought by three people who wanted to stop this kind of censorship before it became routine.

Who Has the Power

The order to dismantle came from the top. Culture Minister Paola Holguín decided the pieces were "adoctrinamiento político" and "versiones sesgadas de nuestra historia" (political indoctrination and biased versions of our history). The decision followed President Abelardo de la Espriella's announcement of a government fight against "wokismo" and the start of what he called a "batalla cultural."

The president, without naming the museum, laid out the doctrine plainly: the "Estado tiene el deber moral insoslayable y político de impedir que los espacios culturales sean captados por el socialcomunismo ateo y enemigo de los valores." The state, in other words, claims a duty to decide what a public memory is allowed to contain.

What came down: dozens of pieces about sexual diversity, feminism and peace processes. Among them, an exhibition of murdered left-wing presidential candidates, plus displays on the LGBT community and local feminist struggles. At least thirty pieces left the collection. The museum holds a large part of the country's historical, artistic and cultural memory, and a minister decided which parts of that memory stay on the wall.

Who Gets Crushed

The people erased from the museum are the ones who were already hardest to see: queer Colombians, feminists, and candidates who were killed. The plaintiffs say the removal "es censura" and "vulnera el derecho a la igualdad y la prohibición de discriminación por orientación sexual e identidad de género." The tutela itself invoked the rights to equality, free expression, truth and historical memory, human dignity and cultural rights.

The order, it's worth noting, stops short of freeing anything. Judge Osorio told the Ministry and the Museum to refrain in the future from removing pieces for "razones relacionadas con su contenido o el punto de vista que expresan," and said any modification must go before the institution's Comité de Gestión Patrimonial. The remedy to state control of memory is another committee inside the same state apparatus. A judge had to step in first, days earlier, just to ask the ministry not to remove, donate or return the dismantled pieces while he studied the case.

The lawsuit was filed by cultural collectives and political opponents from the party of former president Gustavo Petro. A court victory handed down by one official against another is a contest between rival wings of the same machinery, and it can be reversed the moment the machinery changes hands.

What People Actually Did

Before any judge ruled, people showed up. Hundreds demonstrated in front of the museum. They didn't wait for permission. Demonstrators even held classes on the museum's stairs to protest the removal of the thirty-plus pieces, turning the steps of a state institution into an open classroom.

The state answered with force. The museum was surrounded by dozens of riot police and an armored vehicle. The days ended in clashes between uniformed officers and demonstrators, who were driven back with water cannon and tear gas. An armored vehicle and tear gas, deployed over paintings and photographs.

The pattern is hard to miss. The government calls it a cultural battle, and it arrived with riot gear. Whatever the court orders by Monday, the lesson of the stairs stands: memory that ordinary people refuse to let go of doesn't need a ministry's blessing to stay alive.