The Art of the Con

We have to be able to draw a line and say that these things over here are art, whereas these other things are something else (Works of thinking? Concepts incarnate? PhD. dissertations? ) that don’t belong in a place called an art museum. Why? Because otherwise art museums become “stuff in the world” museums or “I had this interesting thought in the shower this morning and I can put it here, because I know the right people” museums.

The fourth floor at the Musée National d’Art Moderne (AKA “The Pompidou,” because the museum is housed in the Centre Pompidou, which has other functions) is a stuff-in-the-world museum with a veneer of art museum. The fifth floor of the Pompidou, by the way, is the “modern” collection that ends chronologically with Warhol, so I was already sweating a little bit when I made the move down a level to the “contemporary” collection. It was there on the fourth floor (in the contemporary collection) that a blood vessel burst behind my left eyeball.

I enjoy a good trolling, but when that trolling is taken seriously by all parties including the artist and the museum without letting the public in on the joke, it becomes a scam. Duchamp was a troll. He knew it, and he was explicit about making a point. His urinal masterpiece is on the fifth floor, but the plaque accompanying it makes clear that Duchamp was making a humorous statement with it and made no claims about its status as something to pay admission to see*.

When we move to the contemporary collection, no such disclaimers are made, including, and pardon my French, I shit you not – about a string of light bulbs. Yep. Just a string of light bulbs on the floor. And what does the Pompidou say about said string of light bulbs?

Untitled (Last Light) symbolizes the endless cycle of life and the passage of time, evoked by the 24 bulbs corresponding to the hours of the day. The idea of loss and renewal is also materialised by the inevitable failure of the bulbs, which are continuously replaced.

No, that’s not a parody of highbrow culture, it really says “symbolizes the endless cycle of life and the passage of time.” If you have to write up an explainer to prove that thing isn’t a just a string of light bulbs and is in fact “art,” it’s probably not art. Let’s move on, though. My hands are shaking in rage too much to continue writing about this.

Next stop on the Pompidou’s fourth floor is Robert Ryman’s Untitled, which “expresses his fascination with the relationship between painting and wall.” I’m not making that up. The plaque really says that.

I’m not going to comment further, and let you meditate on those white squares for while, and then we’ll move on to…

…a blue rectangle. Let’s all pause to finish our whiskeys before we get to…

…a grey rectangle, Gerhard Richter’s Gray no 349. According to the Pompidou’s plaque it “shows traces of roller and sponge and runs of paint that, despite the apparent similarity,  distinguish it from the other 130 Gray paintings.” This one, however, is different in that it “‘represent[s] nothing at all’ but itself.” You just gotta be you sometimes, I guess.

One. Hundred. And. Thirty. (Slow clap.)

At least Richter et al. had the decency to apply the paint to the canvas themselves. George Brecht couldn’t be bothered to actually, you know, create the thing himself. Instead, he “inscrib[ed] laconic instructions on small cards” that the staff of the frickin’ museum followed, and to add insult to laziness, the result is an Ikea showroom.

Let’s visit one final work, that while I certainly won’t bestow the title “art” on, was a much needed palate cleanser. Literally. Giuseppe Penone’s installation, Respirare l’ombra (Breathing the Shadow), is a room lined with cages of bay leaves. It smells wonderful and is a unique experience in an art museum, but let’s not call it art. It’s certainly a thing in this world, but so is my medicated foot powder.

*And this is sort of my point. Reading and talking about Duchamp’s ploy at the Society of Independent Artists in 1917 is  really interesting, and it raises vexing questions about the nature of art, etc. But, actually seeing the urinal in the museum is just not aesthetically interesting – Ha ha, look a urinal! A taxidermied angora goat with a tire around it? Now that’s something to see.