This is an old article, but it's a good piece:For...

This is an old article, but it's a good piece:

For centuries, artists such as Francisco Goya and the Viennese Actionists of the 1960s have pushed the envelope in terms of violent content in art, and challenged what some deem obscene or offensive. Headlines are made annually linking the glorification of violence in the media to school shootings and street murders. Questions are raised: what effect does violent art have on society? How should such expression be moderated? And who is best to make these decisions? 

These decisions are part of Seamus Kealy's everyday life. The curator of the Blackwood Gallery, at the University of Toronto at Mississauga, Kealy enjoys the freedom of what is practically a total lack of boundaries as to what can be exhibited. "I don't really have much concern about showing anything. I think that I can show, in different ways, almost anything," he says, but clarifies, explaining that context and purpose are everything.

This is the gallery from my old campus. 

This begs another question: if depicted violence isn't harmful, does it have a positive effect? To resort to a well-tread phrase, is such violence cathartic? "Sure. Why not?" Kealy responds reluctantly. "Why do we have violence on television? Why do people watch it?' We need it. People would hate to admit it, but we need it.