Thursday, November 21, 2019

Is It Art?


This is on display in front of the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, DC.  I love the Hirshhorn, it's avantgarde collection of modern and contemporary art, it's willingness to push the boundaries.  

So a very large rock, with a face painted on it, on a midsize POS car.   Is it art? If art makes you think, evokes emotion, then I think it is art.  And also maybe the highest and best use of a Chrysler Spirit.   

A real story about boulders on cars.  About 20 years ago, a road construction crew was working near I-75 in northern Kentucky and dislodged a huge boulder, that rolled down hill and landed on the a car parked inches away from a house trailer.  The boulder was huge, really really huge, larger than the car.  The homeowner complained that his car had been crushed and initially the construction company refused to pay for the value of the car saying "there is no evidence that the car is under the boulder." They had a point, but the trailer dweller was left without a car and engaged a lawyer.  The engineers determined that it was impractical to break up the rock in search of the car, and doing so would probably damage or destroy the trailer just inches away.  After some gentle legal persuasion, the construction company paid for the car, and compensated the land owner for "loss of use" for the space the car was parked, that could no longer be effectively used as a parking space.  

Add insult to injury, the County billed the car owner for the property tax on the car the following year.  When the owner protested, the county clerk said, "prove the car is not still in your possession?" Round two for the lawyers, was to prove the car was no longer a car, even if it was still in the possession of the owner. It can be hard to prove a negative. 

Still the question, is it art? 

10 comments:

  1. As Andy Warhol said, "Art is what you can get away with."

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  2. I love this art! The story of the boulder, the car, the construction company, and the county is appalling... and sadly unsurprising.

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    1. The lawyers had fun on those two cases.

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  3. I don't get it. I guess art on some level...but not met worthy.

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  4. a K car - what a POS THOSE were! but art - nah.

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  5. Anonymous11/21/2019

    Oh, I laughed at your story. I like the art. If something stops people in the street and they say, wtf?, it is working as art. I am reminded of an artwork in London, a tree growing up through an old black cab.

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    Replies
    1. It does make you stop and go, Huh?

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