[Guggenheim Is Blasted by Artists for Pulling Works Involving Animals]

The museum planned to show a video of “Dogs That Cannot Touch Each Other,” in which four pairs of dogs try to fight one another but struggle to touch because they are on nonmotorized treadmills, and a video of “A Case Study of Transference,” which shows two pigs having sex before an audience. But “Theater of the World” was the signature work of the show and was going to feature hundreds of live insects and reptiles milling under an overhead lamp.

Image Xu Bing’s “A Case Study of Transference,” 1994. The artwork originally featured live pigs, but the Guggenheim was going to use a video of the Beijing performance. Credit... Xu Bing

The museum said the works were being removed “out of concern for the safety of its staff, visitors and participating artists.”

“Although these works have been exhibited in museums in Asia, Europe and the United States, the Guggenheim regrets that explicit and repeated threats of violence have made our decision necessary,” it said in a statement posted on its website. “As an arts institution committed to presenting a multiplicity of voices, we are dismayed that we must withhold works of art. Freedom of expression has always been and will remain a paramount value of the Guggenheim.”

Criticism of the show grew quickly online, on social media and on animal-rights websites, with the initial focus on “Dogs That Cannot Touch Each Other.” The museum tried to quell the backlash last Thursday, releasing a statement acknowledging that the work was difficult to view but encouraging patrons to consider what the piece “may be saying about the social conditions of globalization and the complex nature of the world we share.”

A spokeswoman for the museum said Thursday that “it was not a question that it would stay in the exhibition.”