Wascally Wabbit

If you're new here, this is a weekly column consisting of letters written to my (eventual) grandchildren (who exist) and my great-grandchildren (who don't, yet) -- the Stickies -- to haunt them after they become grups and/or I'm dead.

[Blogaramians: Blogarama renders the links in my columns useless. Please click on View Original to solve this problem and access lotsa columns.]

                                                 Glossary  

                                  Who the Hell is This Guy?

Irregularly Appearing Imaginary Guest Stars 

Dana -- A Gentlereader
Iggy -- A Sticky (GT*)

Marie-Louise -- My Muse (GT*)

*Currently Grand Touring 

"He was our greatest living painter, until he died." -Mark Twain


Dear (eventual) Grandstickies & Great-Grandstickies (& Gentlereaders),

Recently, a sculpture? created? by Jeff Koons, a three-foot-tall chrome rabbit that was deliberately designed to look like a balloon rabbit -- and cleverly named Rabbit -- sold at auction for $91,100,000. By the time you great-grandstickies come of age it'll probably be worth ten times that.

Huh.

This is a record price for a living, artist?

Huh.

[Alright, I'll bite, what's with the question marks and the, huhs?]

Hey, Dana, glad you asked. First, the huhs. Huh, in this context, is a word in need of a new punctuation mark of some sort to clarify its meaning.

[Huh?]

Well, according to Merriam-Webster huh expresses surprise, disbelief, or confusion, or as an inquiry inviting an affirmative reply. But the first three definitions indicate that there's at least a soft question mark or exclamation point implied. Perhaps both. The fourth calls for a hard question mark.

[Uh-huh.]

However, there's a -- huh -- that means: that's interesting, or weird, or crazy, or notable, or... but in a neutral way. There's no surprise, disbelief, confusion, or inquiry involved. There needs to be some sort of punctuation mark that indicates this neutrality.

Frequently, this huh in need of a new punctuation mark denotes that whatever the huh is referring to, rationally speaking, makes no sense. This is how I use it above. It shares more of its DNA with hmmm that it does with its fellow huhs. 

[Uh-huh, moving on... what's with the question marks?]

I could've used quotation marks but due to my aversion to the use of air quotes I try to only use quotation marks for actual quotes. My use of question marks above is meant to show that, at least as far as Rabbit goes, Mr. Koons is not an artist and Rabbit is not a sculpture. He didn't create it in an artistic way, he designed it in an industrial one.

Of course, those are just my semi-humble opinions, based on what I discovered when I went a-googlin' to verify that the alleged auction was not a hoax, a goof, or a humbug. I was hoping that this was one of those fake news stories everyone is up in arms about at the moment. That it was designed to manipulate people into smiling, as opposed to ginning up outrage.

Nope, it's real.


Jeff Koons designed it. Other people built it in his factory studio. Rabbit is one of many such creations credited to Mr. Koons and cranked out this way. Of course, Mr. Koons employees don't mass produce stuff. They're artisans after all, not deplorable factory workers aching from repetitive stress injuries and hoping to live long enough to retire for a few years before they wake up dead.

Makes sense. After all, if there were lots of chrome balloon bunny rabbits in the world Christie's Auction House probably couldn't get more than a million bucks apiece.


Speaking of Christie's, I found the following description of the work of Mr. Koons on their website.

"Conflating ideas of horror and exuberance, innocence and obscenity into something that is both vacuously monumental and exultantly celebratory, the American multi-media artist holds a mirror up to the modern world — and, like a reflection in the surface of one of his iconic ‘inflatables’, his work reveals society and human nature in all its grotesque contradictions."

I continued my research and discovered the following quote from Alexander Rotter, chairman (chairman?) of post-war and contemporary art for Christie's. "Rabbit is the most important piece by Jeff Koons and I want to go even a step further and say the most important sculpture of the second half of the 20th century."

Huh, well that explains everything... I smack myself in the forehead hard enough to blacken my third eye. Okay, now I get it!


To be fair to Mr. Koons, I confess I had somehow never heard of him prior to the recent auction that made the national news so I went looking for more information. After all, I'm certain that there are far more people in the world who have never heard of me than have never heard of him. 

Perhaps he is a world-class perpetrator of humbugs that rival P.T. Barnum's best work.

In short order, I discovered that in 1990 Mr. Koons gifted the planet Earth with "...paintings, sculptures, and installations..." that "...celebrated, in explicit sexual terms, his union with wife Ilona Staller, Italian porn star...". 

The quote above is from an article at artdaily.org. Warning: don't click on the link if you're easily scandalized as it features a painting that includes a naked Mr. Koons and a nearly naked Mrs. Koons... frolicking?

I also discovered, from the article, that "Among the awards he has received are Officer of the French Legion of Honor; the Artistic Achievement Award from Americans for the Arts; and the Skowhegan Medal for Sculpture."

Huh. Poppa loves you,
Have an OK day. 
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P.S. Gentlereaders, for 25¢ a week, no, seriously, for 25¢ a week you can become a patron of this weekly column and help to prevent an old crank from running the streets at night in search of cheap thrills and ill-gotten gains. Just click here or on the Patreon button at the top or bottom of my website.

Your friendly neighborhood crank is not crazy about social media (I am a crank after all) but if you must, you can like me/follow me on Facebook. I post an announcement when I have a new column available as well as news articles/opinion pieces that reflect where I'm coming from or that I wish to call attention to.

©2019 Mark Mehlmauer As long as you agree to supply my name and URL (Creative Commons license at the top and bottom of my website) you may republish this anywhere that you please. Light editing that doesn't alter the content is acceptable. You don't have to include any of the folderol before the greeting or after the closing except for the title. 

Iconoclasm

If you're new here, this is a weekly column consisting of letters written to my (eventual) grandchildren (who exist) and my great-grandchildren (who don't, yet) -- the Stickies -- to haunt them after they become grups and/or I'm dead.

[Blogaramians: Blogarama renders the links in my columns useless. Please click on View Original to solve this problem and access lotsa columns.]

                                                 Glossary  

                                  Who the Hell is This Guy?

Irregularly Appearing Imaginary Guest Stars 

Dana -- A Gentlereader
Iggy -- A Sticky (GT*)

Marie-Louise -- My Muse (GT*)

*Currently Grand Touring

"I went to the museum where they had all the heads and arms from the statues that are in all the other museums." -Steven Wright 


Dear (eventual) Grandstickies & Great-Grandstickies (& Gentlereaders),

In last week's letter, I mentioned that smartphones, theoretically, make it possible to act when someone throws the oft used phrase, you can look it up! at your psyche.

For the record, although late to the party, I admit to now owning one, a smartphone I mean. I also admit to the opinion that overall, they do more harm than good, particularly culturally speaking.

However, it's not the tool, it's how you use it, and...

[Hah! I call bullpoop, sir! You spend an inordinate amount of time online. Granted, most of your web surfing involves the pursuit of unspeakably dull content or listening to music that our culturally cutting edge social media "influencers" would find to be, well, also unspeakably dull. Still...]

I repeat, Dana, it's not the tool, it's how you use it. As I started to say -- there's a huge difference between taking selfies and/or sharing your fascinating life loudly enough with everyone else in the tiny, uncomfortably upholstered, over-heated or under-cooled waiting room -- and using your phone to access an ever-growing, electronic version of the Library of Alexandria. 

[The what?]

Nevermind.

[Snob.]

Heavy sigh. Anyways...

[It's not anyways, snob, it's anyway. Everyone knows that!]

It's a charming literary device I use all the time to honor the work of David Milch's classic, Deadwood. Now, just get the hell out of here, I've had enough!

SOUND OF DOOR SLAMMING IN MY HEAD


My Dear Stickies and gentlereaders, please forgive the digression. My apologies. What I set out to do was point out that when I was out and about in the world recently I was asked if I found it interesting that iconoclasm (although that particular word was not actually used) has become a fad here in the home of the free and the land of the brave.

Knowing that my knowledge was somewhat limited concerning both the word and the phenomenon it describes, when I had a private moment I whipped out my trusty smartphone and discovered that according to Wikipedia iconoclasm is "the social belief in the importance of the destruction of icons and other images or monuments, most frequently for religious or political reasons."

Now,

I confess that I'm cis-gendered and enthusiastically heterosexual -- a chubby, pasty-faced, melanin-challenged, old man culturally branded with a scarlet letter P due to my unwillingness to repent for, or even acknowledge the legitimacy of, what passes for original sin in certain circles these days, white privilege.

[You may remember that for a minute or two I thought I was an African-American lesbian woman (who looked remarkably like Halle Berry) named Coco trapped in the body of... etc. This went away when I overcame my addiction to mayonnaise sandwiches. Who knew?] 

And,

As you would expect, I have trouble staying woke (in more ways than one) but I do my best.

However,

I'm afraid I don't have much sympathy for those who declare themselves to be traumatized by statues that most Americans were mostly oblivious to prior to the Church of Equity and Social Justice reviving the perennial struggle over freakin' INANIMATE OBJECTS! 


Sorry, I've gone off the rails again. Perhaps just a bite of a mayonnaise sandwich, just a taste to calm my nerves... No, I must be strong. Remember the nightmare that was rehab. Concentrate.

Anyways... when I unexpectedly encountered the word iconoclasm, not a word you encounter all that frequently (at least not yet), the phrase verbal iconoclasm, unbidden, popped into my head.

I think this is a good name for a disturbing phenomenon loose in the world that manifests as no-platforming, the banning of "hate" speech, microaggressions, political correctness, etceteraness -- particularly in America since free speech is enshrined in our Bill of Rights.


Statue smashing (or shrouding, or dismantling), like censorship and book burning, is a time-honored tradition with roots extending back literally thousands of years.

In fact, although my artistic knowledge is rated by The Journal of Fine Arts Majors as Philistine +, I'm endlessly fascinated/appalled by documentaries about the destruction of art in Catholic churches and the like by Protest-ants in the 16th century.

In certain circles, ISIS springs immediately to mind for some reason, iconoclasm is still quite popular. Recently, in Philadelphia, where the Bill of Rights was ratified, a bronze statue of singer and long-dead American icon Kate Smith (1907 - 1986) was covered on a Friday and removed by Sunday.

A highly placed, anonymous, often reliable source in the Philadelphia Flyers organization told me that it was then cut into pieces and buried in an unmarked grave; an exorcism was performed on the sight it had occupied since 1987.

The Flyers, who had been playing Ms. Smith's rendition of God Bless America during home games for as long as anyone can remember, discovered she had recorded songs that contained some racist lyrics -- in the 1930s. 

I was unable to discover if Ms. Smith's Presidential Medal of Freedom will have to be returned. Poppa loves you.

Have an OK day. 
Please scroll down to react, comment, or share.


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P.S. Gentlereaders, for 25¢ a week, no, seriously, for 25¢ a week you can become a patron of this weekly column and help to prevent an old crank from running the streets at night in search of cheap thrills and ill-gotten gains. Just click here or on the Patreon button at the top or bottom of my website.

Your friendly neighborhood crank is not crazy about social media (I am a crank after all) but if you must, you can like me/follow me on Facebook. I post an announcement when I have a new column available as well as news articles/opinion pieces that reflect where I'm coming from or that I wish to call attention to.

©2019 Mark Mehlmauer As long as you agree to supply my name and URL (Creative Commons license at the top and bottom of my website) you may republish this anywhere that you please. You do NOT have to include any of the folderol before the greeting or after the closing except for the title. 

Grand Tour

If you're new here, this is a weekly column consisting of letters written to my (eventual) grandchildren (who exist) and my great-grandchildren (who don't, yet) -- the Stickies -- to haunt them after they become grups and/or I'm dead.

[Blogaramians: Blogarama renders the links in my columns useless. Please click on View Original to solve this problem and access lotsa columns.]

                                                 Glossary  

                                  Who the Hell is This Guy?

Irregularly Appearing Guest Stars 

Dana -- A Gentlereader
Iggy -- A Sticky (GT*)

Marie-Louise -- My Muse (GT*)

*Currently Grand Touring 

"We must go beyond textbooks, go out into the bypaths and untrodden depths of the wilderness and travel and explore and tell the world the glories of our journey."  -John Hope Franklin


Dear (eventual) Grandstickies & Great-Grandstickies (& Gentlereaders),

It occurs to me that although I've previously pointed out that if you pay attention you will learn something every day I haven't mentioned this for a bit. Consider yourselves reminded. 


I was reminded of this when Iggy, my imaginary grandsticky, popped into my consciousness recently. It's been a while. I'm ashamed to say that I've never informed you, or perhaps, more importantly, my gentlereaders, that he and Marie-Louise are in the midst of a Grand Tour.

Their Grand Tour has absolutely nothing to do with the Amazon television series of the same name. It's the sort of Grand Tour popular for a couple of hundred years or so, a couple of hundred years ago, by members of the Lucky Sperm Club. Think of is a practicum for aristocrats in training. This was prior to steamships and rail travel making it easier for the grubby little plebs to access culcha. Specifically, the culcha of the now slowly declining phenomenon called Western civilization.

[Unfortunately, it's top-heavy with old, mostly dead white dudes and as we all know, now that we're woke, old white men were, and are, responsible for nearly everything that's wrong with the world that we know of and probably all sorts of stuff that we don't.]       

See, Iggy and Marie-Louise...

[What the hell does any of this twaddle about Marie-Louise and Iggy's leave of absence have to do with learning something every day?]

Point taken, Dana. Long story short, Iggy wasn't fairing well at our local public school. Between The Gummit, the gummit, the teacher's unions... well, that's a whole other column, maybe a book. He and Marie-Louise, figments of the same imagination, have become quite close.   

She offered to personally take over his education, to become his personal tutor. Since she loves to travel she proposed a hands-on program of education; a sort of perpetual field trip. I miss them both terribly but since I would've happily given up a body part of lesser importance when I was a kid for such an adventure it was impossible to say no.

Besides, they promised to check in on all the major holidays, at a minimum, and...

[Twaddle, twaddle, twaddle!]

AND! when they checked in on Easter Sunday I was reminded of my pay attention and you'll learn something every day dictum because Iggy was overflowing with all sorts of fun facts effortlessly accumulated in the course of their travels.

Accumulated, I assume, because he was paying attention. I remember being so bored in Ms. Wrights third grade class that I attempted to count the number of bricks in the wall of the building across the way from my school. I never got very far because all in all, there are a lot of bricks in a wall.

For the record, I confess that I was worried that without effortless access to my muse I might run short of things to write about. However, Marie-Louise gave me the key to the Inspiration Pantry; she stocked all the shelves to the max before leaving. Not only that, all the inspirations are packed in labeled, waterproof storage boxes and arranged in alphabetical order.

Marie-Louise knows how I swing.


Now, with that out of the way, I'd like to expand on my dictum as regards...

[Giggling, Dana, really? Grow up!]

Harumph! I'd like to expand on my... maxim, that H. sapiens who pay attention will learn something every day. Trying not to drown in the Dizzinformation ocean while holding aloft our overpriced smartphones can make it possible to dramatically increase the knowledge derived from a given lesson. If you wish to maximize the learning that results from paying attention, follow up is required. Smartphones make it possible to follow up on the spot.


Big But
Unfortunately, I've observed that most H. sapiens, who can pull their smartphones faster than Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens can pull his Glock 17, would rather take pictures (often featuring themselves) than engage in some on the spot intellectual edification.

Back in the Black&White Ages, declaring that "You can look it up!" was an effective weapon to wield in a big, juicy, argument because unless you were arguing in a library, neither you or your opponent couldn't, not in the moment at least.

If we had had smartphones back then it would've been possible to offer up evidence of one's obviously correct stance on the spot. This, of course, could've been countered with evidence of the other guy's person's position and the big, juicy argument could continue till it wasn't fun anymore and everyone finished their beer and called it a night, and as hard as might be for you to believe, still be friends.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus... and once upon a time it was possible to have an enjoyable, good-natured, logic and intelligence testing argument without anyone being "triggered," or reaching for their Glock 17.

There's a lesson for ya. Poppa loves you.

Have an OK day. 
Please scroll down to react, comment, or share.


* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
P.S. Gentlereaders, for 25¢ a week, no, seriously, for 25¢ a week you can become a patron of this weekly column and help to prevent an old crank from running the streets at night in search of cheap thrills and ill-gotten gains. Just click here or on the Patreon button at the top or bottom of my website.

Your friendly neighborhood crank is not crazy about social media (I am a crank after all) but if you must, you can like me/follow me on Facebook. I post an announcement when I have a new column available as well as news articles/opinion pieces that reflect where I'm coming from or that I wish to call attention to.

©2019 Mark Mehlmauer As long as you agree to supply my name and URL (Creative Commons license at the top and bottom of my website) you may republish this anywhere that you please. You do NOT have to include any of the folderol before the greeting or after the closing except for the title of the column.