Oh no! Stars of art world petition for museums, concert halls to close in protest on Inauguration Day

Brett T. | 8:38 PM on January 11, 2017

There aren’t any NFL games scheduled on Inauguration Day, so does this mean there won’t be any mixed martial arts on TV either? Oh, wait … Meryl Streep said at the Golden Globes that football and mixed martial arts are not the arts. So what’s the deal January 20?

According to the New York Times, more than 130 artists and critics have signed a petition calling for a “J20 Art Strike,” during which museums, concert halls, and other cultural institutions would close to protest “the normalization of Trumpism — a toxic mix of white supremacy, misogyny, xenophobia, militarism, and oligarchic rule.”

More than 130 artists and critics are calling for cultural institutions to close on the day of Trump's inauguration https://t.co/vXEU1s51K4

— The New York Times (@nytimes) January 10, 2017

So the employees can watch the inauguration on tv?

— Stephanie (@steph780278) January 10, 2017

Just to be clear, according to a statement by the group:

It is not a strike against art, theater or any other cultural form. It is an invitation to motivate these activities anew, to reimagine these spaces as places where resistant forms of thinking, seeing, feeling and acting can be produced.

Major museums don’t seem to be on board with the strike, as some contacted by the Times will maintain regular hours, while another is offering free admission that day. Somewhere in the country, though, a museum will close, and a staffer will have the satisfaction of telling a group of school children it’s Donald Trump’s fault their field trip is canceled.

Damn! That was the day I was planning my heteronormative research on cultural institution cultivation, too. #bummer

— Ryan (@ryanfield) January 10, 2017

https://twitter.com/RepRepublic/status/818946879308189696