Showing a video documentary of seminal performance artist Marina Abramovic has erupted into a scandal at a Southern California high school. Now, an art history teacher has been removed and the school's popular principal fired, leaving questions about whether contemporary art led to the upheaval.

Roderick Urquidi, a San Clemente High School teacher, showed the HBO documentary Marina Abramovic: The Artist is Present (2012) in his AP Art History class. The piece follows the artist preparing for one of her most important works and includes scenes from her 2010 retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York. Abramovic, who is clothed, is shown sitting with museum visitors (and with celebrities). Other young artists are shown nude in the piece which explores identity, sex and violence.

On May 6, an announcement was made that "Principal Michael Halt would not finish the school year nor would he return for the 2015-2016 school year," reports the OC Weekly. Some parents voiced support for Halt in a letter to the editor of the San Clemente Times, even while deriding Urquidi for "a pattern of questionable behavior demonstrated during the school year."

The school's newspaper noted that groups of students and parents felt the principal's dismissal was a direct result of the art history teacher's showing of The Artist is Present, but they are still awaiting answers from the school board. Halt's firing was reportedly due to “health and safety issues” although specific reasons have not been made public. In a closed session school board meeting in early June, Halt was voted in to an alternative role in the school district not at the high school.