I, Claudius (Seattle Version)

I recently had the opportunity to spend a day in Seattle. I was surprised to find that Claudius, the emperor of Rome some two millennia ago, had found new employment. At the Seattle Art Museum, he helps remind us of the cultural decay into which our civilization has fallen.

This is because one cannot avoid comparing the small collection of magnificent antiquities (of which his bust forms a part) with the bulk of the exhibits, which constitute one of the most revolting displays of bad taste to ever grace the walls and floors of an American museum.

Normally, in a major city, the “elite” feel some vague obligation to hang a respectable gallery of paintings from the grand styles. Thus for example in the San Diego art museum—a monument to mediocrity and Leftist chic if there ever was one—you will at least find a few Impressionists and post-Impressionists, enough to assuage the urge to violence that overtakes even a peaceful soul while passing the office of the curator.

But no such relief awaits the visitor in Seattle. I counted two paintings and no sculpture to represent the entire period from 1700 to the beginning of complete abstraction. Nothing from the nineteenth century, no Impressionists, no Hopper, no Eakins, not so much as a third-rate Cubist. As if art had disappeared for two and a half centuries.

Ahh, but then it reappears, and with a vengeance. The harbinger could be seen outside, over the entranceway:

These words refer to a special exhibition, a compendium of depraved detritus related to Andy Warhol and to a local rock star, Kurt Cobain, who committed suicide in 1994. Cobain, whose first band boasted the picturesque name “Fecal Matter,” was a pioneer in the Grunge movement (I’m not making this up). According to the museum, this illustrious trailblazer is “arguably Seattle’s greatest cultural export of the past two decades.” What, greater than Starbucks?

Such fascinating things one can learn at an art museum! And I thought it was a place to behold Rembrandt and Renoir. Silly me.

So getting back to the sign above the entrance: The contents of the museum were indeed full of emotions; the building is a paean to the feelingization of art. In other words, I vomit, you watch. Which is precisely what an “artist” named Sam Gilliam did for us:

Sam must have eaten at an Italian restaurant, judging by the excess of marinara, though apparently some avocado is present—could it be guacamole?

This work is described as an exemplar of the “Post-Minimalist” school. Given that Minimalism is itself a farcical rejection of art, what is the significance of adding the “post”? What will be next, SuperPostMinimalBigMoneyArtScamInYourFace-ism?

Continuing the maximization of the minimal, here’s one that belongs to …[clears throat]… a “seminal group of sculpture”:

No, you’re not hallucinating. It really is nothing more than two slabs of wood. A seminal con job, I would say.

Then of course the obligatory white on white:

What do you make of this seminal aluminum foil:

Recalling that Seattle is Microsoft’s home turf, perhaps it symbolizes the impact upon brain cells of staring at a computer monitor for eight hours straight.

Let us not neglect the museum’s spacious lobby, which has this lovely “installation” suspended overhead:

Could it be symbolic of the creeping socialism of the Obama regime, as it takes over the auto industry? Umm…not quite. I learned that this exhibit, called Inopportune: Stage One, is a “large-scale installation work consisting of a meticulous arrangement of life-size cars and multichannel tubes that seem to blow up in sequence, symbolizing a series of car explosions.”

At that point, my brain was about to “blow up in sequence.” I turned toward the window overlooking First Avenue, and finally beheld something artistic: