Mes Dames, here is a Rorschach Test moment – What do you see? The best answer will be rewarded with a calming pack of Twinings English Breakfast tea or a lifetime abo for Dr. Flynn depending on its nature.
But as we have an expert on this matter, let’s hear what Neal Caffrey’s reply was when Peter Burk accuses Jackson Pollock to have “splattered paint on a canvas”:
“What I’d pay to have that bat in my collection.”
“I bet it’s a lot of money for that piece of wood.”
“’Piece of wood’?”
“Yeah, take away the fact that DiMaggio swung it, it’s just a bat.”
“But some guy named Pollock can splatter paint on a canvas and you think it’s worth millions of Dollars.”
“’Splattered paint on a canvas’? You stand in front of one of Pollock’s works, the chaos fades away and you see the discipline, the balance of restraint and abandon.”
“Like when DiMaggio stepped up to the plate.”
“Great art has a broader meaning. It captures a time, a place, an emotion.”
“This bat was used to set the all-time hit-streak record the same year Hirohito bombed Pearl Harbor. For four, fice at-bats a say Joltin’ Joe let Americans forget that we were going to war.”
“A time, a place, an emotion.”
Well, time, place and an emotion. Add name to the mix in today’s world, especially in a week an Adolf Hitler watercolor drawing did not just sell in an auction, but sold with a higher price than a Picasso. OK, the Picasso was an itsy bitsy sketch in red crayon on a torn out catalogue page, more like chicken scratches, but it was signed by him. The real questions are: Why do Hitler things sell at all? And why do we worship names more than ideas and real skills? Sigh.
Back to our topic at hand. Though time, place and emotions were most likely given and I have a couple of theories on how the paint could have gotten on the paper all smeared and dissolved with fluids that might be wilder than the actual act, I’m sorry to say but it ain’t a Jackson Pollock. Yet, Mr. Brunetti and Ms. Cassidy definitely have skills to praise them for or we weren’t here.
And in the end, 50 Shades of Grey gave us a lesson again on the opinion of critics on what’s art or not – worth our time or something at all or not – and what it’s worth. After all Mr. Brunetti just experiences his biggest opening weekend ever and this is the result:
(The quote is from White Collar S3E15 Stealing Home.)
Dana's Dames 