I put together a screening of the work here in Chicago at the School of the Art Institute and my experience from that has been that the more other institutions show it, especially in a setting conductive to open dialogue, the more likely the complexity of Wojanowicz’s will be explored by people who might never have thought about the work.

Specifically: Many of the different institutions across the U.S. and elsewhere have been showing all three versions: the 13 min, the 7 min and the 4 min version that was removed from the Smithsonian. Having watched all three, it is shocking to me that Jonathan Katz, curator of the show, was allowed to re-edit the piece in the way he did, adding the soundtrack of an ActUP march, which came from a recording in Wojnarowicz’s archives but had nothing to do with A Fire in My Belly. The 13-min version, which by all accounts is closest to the complete work that Wojnarowicz intended, bears very little resemblance to the 4-min version.

Without the fervor surrounding this exhibition, I have no doubt that conversations problematizing the ways in which this work has been re-edited and reduced to a specific kind of political art would not be currently being had.

So, perhaps we should write a letter to the Catholic League and say thanks?