After attending Wayne State University, I came face to face with the fact that I was dealing with a brainwashing program. In Art Appreciation, the instructor put up a slide of a clear lucite block with metal rods sticking out of it. We were told, with great emotion, that this was a man’s life!
Art is a communications medium. Even cave art was meant to portray and communicate. And I don’t doubt the painters had fun with it.
For my final exam in the Advanced Painting class, I handed in one of those pieces of non-representational art. I just took a piece of canvas board, and used the paint out of the tube with no mixing. I was done in 15 minutes. My instructor was impressed: "Why haven’t you been doing this all along?’ Exit - stage left.
That and going to the nearby art museum and spotting a little white card on the floor next to a spiral of duct tape; “Please do not remove. This is art.” Obviously, someone had to warn the uninitiated lest they scrape it up off the floor as a spiral of duct tape. I asked my instructor about it, and he gave me this elaborate story of some man’s life.
Peace,
Ed