Washington Post columnist and brilliant humorist Dave Barry had me in stitches at the local Health Bar where I usually have Sunday breakfast. He describes his visit to an art show in Miami, the sort frequented by “Serious Art People, who wear mostly black outfits and can maintain serious expressions no matter what work of art they are viewing.” The column is hilarious, not because it’s a parody of the “Serious Art Community,” but because it’s so accurate. He quotes from the gallery description of an old broken chair for sale for $2,800: “The chair offers not a weedy patina of desuetude but an apotheosis of its former occupant.” As Barry then concedes, “See, I missed that altogether, about the desuetude and the apotheosis. I thought it was just a crappy old junk chair some guy took off a trash pile and was now trying to sell for 2,800 clams.” Brilliant! (The full description from “Art Critical” is also available online.)
