ARTRIX - Scene 1
It is the mid 80s. At a hearing in front of the partially
clothed town council of Suburbia, Postmodernist artisit Jesuso proposes to place
a large, wrapped sculpture in the town. Shon Clod, Jesuso's wife, begins to speak.
Shon Clod: Jesuso was born in the small country of Bulgariaham
to his virgin mother. Since the beginning, people could sense that he was the
gift the world was waiting for. He would lead his Postmodernist people to righteousness.
He has built such wonders as the Running Fence, the wrapped Florida Keys... Oh
wait, those weren't really wrapped. You just surrounded them islands with that
pink woven polypropylene didn't you? All that wrapping blends together after a
while. Wrapped coast, wrapped bridge, it's all the same. Anyhow, here he is, my
partner and lover... the fabulous Jesuso!
Jesuso: Thank you, partner and lover. Mr. Councilman Fischl,
I wish to put up a giant wrapped sculpture. I will fund the endeavor. Here are
many years worth of detailed plans.
Jesuso hands the council many years worth of detailed plans.
Fischl: The council and I have examined the plans you presented
to us and have come to some conclusions: we are not concerned that the piece is
severly phallic and closely resembling a penis and would be erected close to the
kindergarten. However, its placement on the hill would cast a malevolent shadow
on our prize-winning flower bed. We know that the sculpture will only be up for
6 hours, but even such a short time it could make our tulips wither. For this
reason and in the interest of just being generally conservative, we herby deny
the request for your horribly creative and intellectual piece of art.
Jesuso: While I am very saddned by your denial and hypocrasy
I still respect your decision because this social challenge is part of the art.
You may not be aware, but many of my other projects have have not come about without
negative response from some of the public. My work requires years of negotiations
and permissions. Unlike most artisits, I have to convince the audience a piece
is valid before I make it. The Running Fence that I began in 1976 crossed 24 miles
of lightly populated land and caused no environmental damage or interfererence
with daily practicalities. I am a genius becuase I meld originality, imagination,
energy, enthusiasm, and productivity.
Shon Clod: Hallelujah!
Jesuso: Again, Thank you Clod. This an age of mass production
of everything, even art. That is one reason why I wrap. It is packaging. It reveals
and conceals. With my art, especially my larger projects, I want the viewer to
see the piece on his own time, not forced into viewing it like in the museums.
The experience must be special, a viewer and subject in the environment. As the
viewer sees fit, my art can go from a backdrop to center stage. After years of
complexity, success comes with a viewer's peaceful encounter.
Sergeant of Arms: Thank you, Jesuso, for you informative diatribe.
This has been a productive meeting, but we have to ajurn because the town has
a sheduled sexual orgy in morally ambiguous context—err, no, I mean that
we have to go and secretly control the nation's modern art through funneling high
quality fine art through a underground system of—err, I mean we go do our
laundry now.
The gavel falls, and the town hall empties.
onward to the contrasts...
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