Art, Shmart

Two things happened this morning which I would like to note here, not because I am at all superstitious, I’m sure it was just a total coincidence, but just because these two things happening, within seconds of each other, is weird enough to be worthy of note.

It was about a quarter past 6 in the morning and I was on my way to work because on Thursdays I have a class that starts at 7, and it was still night, not like beginning to be dawn, but still black night.  I looked up, it was a clear enough sky to see plenty of stars, and zippo! A shooting star.  Haven’t seen one in years and it’s always a pleasure and I see it as an omen of good luck (except, of course, as I said, I’m not at all superstitious).  Then I looked down at the ground (hey, walking’s like driving, you’ve got to be checking all around) and a black cat walked across the sidewalk right in front of me.

This painted pastiche of newsprint and vomit was sold for 80 million dollars

Just thought I’d mention that.

Tonight’s topic, though, is art, particularly paintings, and this little quiz that somebody put up on my facebook page. Go ahead, take the quiz.  Million dollar art or yard sale art.  I scored 7 out of 15, which is  the same as just flat out guessing. Which is, of course, what I was doing.

I am not a sophisticated viewer of art.  I strongly suspect that a lot of the people who bought these paintings aren’t, either.  I suspect that the very people who spent 2, 4, or 10 million  dollars for some color splashed on canvas also scored 7 or 8 on this test.  Rich people just have too damn much money.

Same with poetry.  I don’t get non-representational art and I don’t get 9/10ths of modern poetry.  The difference is that nobody ever spends a million dollars for a poem, or even a book.