A tiny statuette of a voluptuous naked woman, which is said to be 30,000 years old, was discovered in the Austrian village of Willendorf in the early 20th century and is considered “the icon” of the museum, the facility’s director general Christian Koeberl said in a statement. The 11 centimetre (4 inch) statue from the early stone age is “the most popular and best-known prehistoric representation of a woman worldwide,” he added.
The prehistoric “Venus of Willendorf” figurine is considered a masterpiece of the Palaeolithic era. Yet, it has found itself in recent news as Facebook has censored it. The Natural History Museum in Vienna, where it resides, has been harsh in its response to this.
The controversy began in December when Italian arts activist Laura Ghianda posted a picture of the artwork on the social networking site which went viral. After it was censored she messaged that “this statue is not ‘dangerously pornographic’. The war on human culture and modern intellectualism will not be tolerated.”
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The natural history museum voiced outrage, saying in its statement; “we think that an archaeological object, especially such an iconic one, should not be banned from Facebook because of ‘nudity’, as no artwork should be.
“Let the Venus be naked! Since 29,500 years she shows herself as prehistoric fertility symbol without any clothes. Now Facebook censors it and upsets the community,” it said.
“There is no reason for the Natural History Museum Vienna to cover the ‘Venus of Willendorf’, and hide her nudity, neither in the museum nor on social media,” Koeberl insisted. He further added that there has never been any complaints from visitors regarding the nudity.
Facebook is regularly criticised over content which it bans or indeed content it allows to be published.