Fake artwork and discrimination: The MONA Ladies Lounge saga

On a Chilei, Tasmania morning, a media pack of cameras and journalists that pitched outside a bar and hobart. They're waiting for Kersha Keshler, an artists curator and wife of the owner of Mona. When she finally emerges, she's followed by a congolin of supporters dressed in navy suits and pearls. They're on their way to the Supreme Court of Tasmania to appeal an anti discrimination ruling, a ruling which forced Keshela to shut down one of her art installations, and

I have.

I visited in March. And it's really just a small private room inside this huge museum that everyone knows so well, Mona. And it's really just a cordoned off space that's bordered by long green silk curtains and a woman sitting at the front of this room and she will only allow in ladies or people who identify as ladies, so no men allowed. The only time they're allowed in there is

Well, I'm in the Ladies Lounge at Mona. It's a beautiful space for women to escape this strange and disjointed world of male domination and relish and the pure company of women while being served by a retinue of butlers who live to give us every dream and joy.

It's very tongue in cheek and playful and essentially you go in there and there's a big green velvet couch and there's some artworks. It was interesting to see the difference between men's reactions and women's reactions. I was inside the lounge and I could hear a guy outside saying, is there.

A men's lounge?

And then he said, the last time I went to a men's lounge, it cost me a couple of hundred, you know, So it's sort of poking fun a bit. But he was he seemed a little bit upset about it. And yet inside the lounge it was interesting to hear what women were saying. And there was a young woman in the lounge and she just said, it's so nice to be told that only ladies can come in here.

So it sounds delightful it is. But how did the Lady's Lounge first wind up in legal trouble?

Well, it wound up in legal trouble because.

Last year in April, a man called Jason Lao, a man from New South Wales, visited Mona and he wasn't allowed in because that's the whole point of the artwork, and he took exception to that and he thought, well, that's discriminatory.

Jason lo complained, I visited Mona, paid thirty five dollars on the expectation I would have access to the museum, and I was quite surprised when I was told I would not be able to see one exhibition the Lady's Lounge. Now Jason Lao has taken the museum to the Tasmanian Civil and Administrative Tribunal alleging discrimination.

Now, so Kersha was delighted that this case had been brought to the tribunal, that had been brought to the courts, because it was a way of actually showing what the artwork is about.

And I'm extremely grateful to mister Lao for the last year because we get to exercise the argument, and I think it's completely fascinating.

It highlights that the very fat that men are being rejected from the ladies Lounge means that they are.

Experiencing the artwork as she intended.

You know, the very intention of the artwork is to let men experience what it's like to be discriminated against.

So the main statement that the artwork is making is that rejection in itself is an artistic statement that doesn't necessarily sound like a solid legal argument. So how did that play out the tribunal?

That's right, It is a really interesting legal case. How do you argue in law that the Ladies Lounge should exist? The Antidiscrimination Act has an exemption. It has many exemptions, and the exemption that Mona's legal counsel we're relying on is section twenty six that allows for discrimination if a plan or program or arrangement promotes equal opportunity for a

I men are not allowed to enter Kersher and all of her supporters.

They were very cheeky and they performed a silent, synchronized routine inside the tribunal. You know, they were crossing and uncrossing their legs and they were peering down their glasses at the proceedings and nothing rude, but just you know, nonetheless, they were performing in the court and the tribunal member in his room only noted this notice this behavior and stead it, you know, bored it on contempt of court.

It doesn't seem right that the lady's Lounge has to close. I think that I think that the Coote took too narrow a reading of the Anti Discrimination Act.

And she thought, how could I reform it?

And I remember speaking to her about it at the time, and she thought, well, I could make a Sunday school there. Because religious institutions are exempt from discrimination. There's a whole lot of other discrimination exemptions, i e.

Toilet church school, reform school. There's a number of exemptions, and I think we might be able to meet all of them.

But she decided at the end to simply close it.

And to appeal the arguments that were made at the Tribunal.

After the break, the case finds its way to the Supreme Court. So Gabriella, let's turn to the appeal. The tribunal decided that the ladies lounge was discriminatory. The case has now made its way to the Supreme Court. Where's it up to it at the moment.

So this week the appeal was on at the Supreme Court of Tasmania. And just as we had during the tribunal hearing in March, it was a it was quite quite a spectacle, not inside the court because you have to behave inside the court.

But outside the court.

Kersher reprised the performances that she had organized.

During the tribunal hearing.

Well, this time she had something like sixty or seventy supporters with her, all dressed in navy suits and pearls and very well groomed, looking very serious, and they walked very slowly and deliberately into the Supreme Court of Tasmania. This time, however, we seemed to have a more sympathetic hearing with the Acting Justice Shane Marshall. But essentially we had Mona's counsel Catherine Scott reiterating that the Ladies' lounge could exist under Section twenty six because it promoted equal

Etc. We all know the stats.

So she was arguing that Section twenty six does apply, and that the tribunal didn't apply that exemption appropriately and that they erred by not doing that. This Section twenty six was absolutely valid.

But you mentioned that this time around the judge in this case appeared more sympathetic. So how has the judge reacted so far?

There was an interesting sort of exchanges between Mona's Council and the judge. Acting Justice Shane Marshall borrowed a phrase that Mona's Council, Catherine Scott had coined. She described the Ladies Lounge as a flip universe where it's.

The men who were sidelined.

You know, in the same way that until nineteen sixty five, women in Australia were forbidden to drink at a public bar with men and were relegated to the so called ladies lounge, This lady's.

Lounge at Mona.

Flipped that around and said, men, you're not allowed to you're not allowed to enter.

He knows this discrimination.

He talked about, you know, yeah, the ladies lounge where my mother and I used to get shunted in pubs in Port Melbourne.

So it sounds like the judges is more sympathetic to the argument. I've got to be careful that we don't assume too much there. But what did the defense have to say?

So the defense argued that Mona's Council had really not properly shown how the Ladies Lounge promotes equal opportunity. Greg Barnes said that the evidence that had been provided to the tribunal by Monas Council really focused on his historic discrimination.

You know, it didn't show how.

This Lady's Lounge was actually dealing with contemporary discrimination.

And interestingly, the judge.

Picked Greg Barnes up on that and said, well, but they presented the Government Status of Women report card.

What about that?

You know, don't you can you know, do you still make your point given that?

And Greg Barnes said, yes, we do.

And he also said, you know, you can't just use Section twenty six in an open slather so that anyone who has a political or social point to make can say, well, I'm going to create a space that excriminates against these, against such and such a person to make my political point. He said that that's not the way that Section twenty six is supposed to operate.

So another thing Greg Barnes also brought up in court was the idea around fake paintings and that the picassos that are actually in the lounge were fake. Can you tell me why he mentioned that, what his motivation was behind that.

Yeah.

The reason he mentioned that was because during the tribunal part of Kersha's evidence, she talks about the lady's lounge being filled with expensive artworks, some of the most expensive artworks in the art collection, and she talks about that in the sense of men not being able to see these expensive artworks so they really can understand what it's like to be excluded. Greek Barnes's point, as I understand it, is that that evidence.

That Kirsher provided was not valid.

It was not correct because in fact, these so called expensive picassos weren't Picassos at all. They were painted by herself. But for Kusher, that's part of the joke. That's part of the joke of this artwork. You know, she's painting the artworks of a famous misogynist and she thinks that's that's the funny thing.

There's also rumors in the art world as well that disliked the Pikassos in the lounge itself, that the case is also fake, that it's nothing more than a public distart. You've spoken to Kersher herself. What sort of sense of how seriously she's taking this did you get from her?

Oh, she's taking it seriously, and I have spoken. I did put that rumor question to Kirsher and she said, no, it's it's absolutely for real. She too can understand why people might say that, but she said it's absolutely for real.

Outside the this week, she talked about Jason.

Loud being a gift and that women should be indebted to him.

Jason Lower is a gift from day one.

I love Jason Loud and he's a lovely man and he really believes in having the debate the conversation. I'm indebted to him, Braver.

I think all women are.

He brought this point to the fourth and I think we should ask celebrate.

But she's very serious about it too. She will continue with this and we'll see where it goes from here.

Gabriella. The Lady's Lounge is an artwork, and an art is often provocative. But I suppose the heart of the issue is the question does the Ladies Lounge actually promote equal opportunity? Do you think that there is equal opportunity here in regards to the whole experience of the Lady's Lounge?

Well, I would, I guess I would defer to Robin Banks, who's the Tasmani's former Anti discrimination commissioner, who's written a really great essay on this, and she believes that discrimination didn't take place. All I can say is, I guess my sympathies do lie with Mona and the Lady's Lounge, having been in there, having been inside and seeing the looks of kind of like surprise and excitement of the women who had this space for themselves, particularly the young woman.

And I guess I kind of.

Think it's interesting that a man was so upset by not being allowed into that space that he launched legal action.

In a sense, that's telling too. That is very Gabriella.

Thank you for joining us.

Thank you.

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