Day 8 - Anti-Art

Today is the eight of our twenty-one day odyssey and so far I have felt offended only once. Everything else has been outstanding. The offence came in the way of an eyesore. No, it wasn't the plastic bottles and soccer balls we saw floating, and perhaps trapped for years, in an eddy on the Tiber. It wasn't even the Gypsy lady sidling up close to Carol-Ann, no doubt hoping to pinch something from the shopping bag my trusting spouse had slung over her arm.

And it surely wasn't the Nigerians (?) selling cheap imitation Gucci bags without a permit. (Actually, James and I found the cat and mouse game they played with the local carabenieri to be quite entertaining.) No, none of these bothered me much.

The object that aroused my indignation was much more deliberately done, I'm sure, purposely to infuriate people like me. It was a rather large piece of modern day abstract sculpture erected not ten minutes walk from one of the most beautiful edifaces in Rome, the Pantheon. Resembling nothing more closely than three huge semi-vertical doggie turds spray painted in lime green, pink and orange! Ugh, ugh, ugh! What were the city fathers thinking to allow this? Was it some ill-conceived plan to contrast today's "art" with that of the past?

It is fortunate indeed that Michaelangelo, DaVinci and the other great masters are not alive to see it. It was as I was staring at this "anti-art" monstrosity and pondering this very question that I felt I could hear from somewhere within the deep recesses of Rome their laughter and the following snippet of a conversation:

"They may have improved on my inventions but they sure have regressed in the field of art," sniped a voice I took to be DaVinci's, "This is about as out of place here as a shit fly in my minestrone soup."

"Good one, Leo," Cackled another (Michaelanglo's I think),"Haw, haw, haw!"

That was all, and as I said before, the rest of the day went swimmingly.

Noel