Thursday, June 15, 2006
CHUNK AND STICK EXHIBITED
Now that I’ve got three friends on the ABC board—Janet Albrechtsen, Dr Ron Brunton, and, as of yesterday, Keith Windschuttle—it can’t be long before I’m hosting some kind of unwatchable ABC Sunday afternoon arts program. With a particular focus on modern art:
One of Britain’s most prestigious art galleries put a block of slate on display, topped by a small piece of wood, in the mistaken belief it was a work of art.
The Royal Academy included the chunk of stone and the small bone-shaped wooden stick in its summer exhibition in London.
But the slate was actually a plinth and the stick was designed to prop up a sculpture.
The sculpture itself - of a human head - was nowhere to be seen.
The academy explained the error by saying the plinth and the head were sent to the exhibitors separately.
“Given their separate submission, the two parts were judged independently,” it said in a statement.
“The head was rejected, the base was thought to have merit and accepted.”