On Sunday, Culture Minister
Lena Adelsohn Liljeroth participated in an event at the museum that involved
several cakes designed by artists, including one in the shape of the naked
torso of a black woman.
The black cake, part of an
exhibition on World Art Day, was intended as part of Afro-Swedish artist Makode
Linde's project illustrating degrading stereotypes of black people through
history.
However, a Swedish
organisation promoting the rights of people of African origin called the cake
exhibit racist and said that Liljeroth should resign for participating in a
"tasteless, racist spectacle."
Liljeroth, whose photograph
cutting a piece of the cake was widely shown in Swedish media, said she
understood why people would be offended by the incident.
"I was invited to speak
at World Art Day about the freedom of art and its right to provoke," she
said in a statement to The Associated Press. "And then they wanted me to
cut into the cake. I don't review art, but I can very well understand that this
whole situation was misunderstood."
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