Art By Accident

Peter Bagge does a nice job skewering the fine art establishment in this comic. Speaking as someone who has had a variety of museum memberships over the years, much of his criticism is completely on target. The art world in general seems almost completely unable to make any critical distinctions of quality in this day and age.

I think the best comment on the whole issue came from a friend who has a Master's degree in Painting and two undergraduate art degrees. He also teaches art at a university in Alabama. We were looking at a pile of broken glass with attached neon signage in the basement of a museum one day when I asked how this was art. His response?

"If you can convince someone else it's art and get them to pay for it, it's art."

For a guy that can spit out pretentious art babble with the best of them, this was a fairly direct statement. I recall this frequently when I go look at things deemed art or artistic.