Another art rant

An old post that I wrote put forgot to publish:

My girl friend volunteered at another art soiree, I ended up going because it was her roommates birthday and we were all going to meet at the art museum and then get drinks once my girlfriend was done.This time I took pictures, and fortunately for me her friends, whose opinion on modern art mirrors my own, came along.

We spent our time blankly looking at bad art, I.e modern and some good art, classical and tribal. A friend of hers, who is studying to become a doctor, was equally incredulous when he saw that the ancient Roman and Greek section filled only a single solitary wall.  My girlfriends cousin wandered around with a blank look on her face.

Here we see that statue I mentioned. The one with a Jesus holding a pig and flipping the bird. I'm sure the artist will claim that's its provocative and will cause personal reflection on our society or some nonsense like that. Never mind that its little more than shock art, and that the public gas been inundated with this garbage for so long that it no longer registers. That blank look on peoples faces isn't shock, it's boredom. It's a sad sign of the times we live in.  This art literally has no redeeming value.  This isn't shocking because it is trying to force us to confront uneasy truths or realities. No, its shocking for the sake of being shocking.  I at least took some solace that this monstrosity garnered no attention from a public that has since long become used to such crass displays.

More frustrating is that what could be considered on of pinnacle periods of art, classic Greco-Roman art, barely occupies a portion of a small room at my urban museum.

This sad show is almost all that we have in our art museum of what could be considered the pinnacle of western civilization, outside perhaps of the late 19th and early 20th century, when it comes to art.  And it is not for a lack of piece, I was told by one volunteer that there are plenty of ancient art pieces sitting in storage waiting for their rotation, but the preference is for the 'art', that is an attempted assault on a persons sensibilities. But after having been inundated with images like this:

For he better part of a century, what is the point of shock art that isn't so shocking anymore? Money pure and simple.  There is an entire industry that has sprung up around this kind of garbage simply because it attracts headlines, which is funny, because while art critics think this is a big deal, newspapers think its a big deal, and some organizers with more money than sense think this is big deal, the common man doesn't.  And yet they bemoan the fact that no one goes to art museums anymore. I wonder why.