My wife and I often record “CBS Sunday Morning” and watch it in sips all week. A recent segment featured an “artist” now on display at the Guggenheim. Curious, I looked him up. For five grand — or $440 a month — you can own piece No. 35, “Run.” The program didn’t show it, but after sampling his other work, I’d seen enough. I’ll be plain in that Chebanse way: It looks like something my 2-yearold granddaughter might joyfully smear before snack time. She’s cuter, too — and cheaper.
(And, to think, I once suspected Dalí, Warhol and Picasso were a ruse. It turns out they were the warm-up act.)
The segment brought to mind Hans Christian Andersen’s 1837 fable, “The Emperor’s New Clothes.” Two swindlers promise a fabric “invisible to fools.” The peasants — terrified of looking uncouth — praise what they cannot see. At last, a child — possibly from Chebanse, with mustard on shirt — blurts the obvious: “The emperor is naked.”
Today, the clapping isn’t about taste; it’s woke policy and the fear it manufactures. Since 2020, institutions have stapled ideology to everything: newsrooms that punish the “wrong” adjectives; corporations that mandate virtue calisthenics; public facilities that declare unisex bathrooms nonnegotiable; sports bodies that move men into women’s divisions without debate; brands that cheer protests while pretending the riots never happened; and pronoun protocols that turn conversation into HR paperwork. (For the record, my pronouns are “stud” and “muffin.”)
The art world runs on the same engine. Grants and residencies reward the statement before the painting. Museums and biennials want box-checked essays first, eyes later. Curators and critics master the dialect of safety — artspeak Mad Libs that flatter policy, not perception. So, we stand before a canvas that leaves us cold, and instead of saying “I don’t see it,” we salute the label like it outranks us. Longer labels, thinner paint.
Let’s quit pretending the hush is organic. It’s enforced. And, yes, I feel the shadow of woke-ism over my shoulder every time I write a commentary — and I despise it. What people call “woke” isn’t courtesy; it’s a rulebook that sorts every question by identity and power, then fines you for reading it out of tune. After George Floyd overdosed in 2020, that rulebook hardened into policy across newsrooms, corporations, schools, sports and the arts. Question the sanctioned narrative about the protests and the riots? You’re morally suspect. Question the fairness in women’s sports? Bigot. Decline the kneeling ritual during the anthem? Sit down and shut up.
Modern art can be brilliant — some of it rearranges your insides — but there’s a difference between art that challenges you and a system that compels you. Challenge invites disagreement and survives it. Compulsion demands applause on cue and calls your silence “harm.” Tie prestige and funding to ideology, and you don’t get braver artists, you get safer administrators and a thesaurus full of excuses.
Viewed this way, “Run at the Guggenheim” isn’t a quirky oneoff; it’s akin to 1,000 “everybody clap” moments. The tailors are policy writers and compliance officers. If we’re honest, the courtiers are toadies in curatorial black, HR and brand management. The emperor is the institution’s reputation. And the public — the ordinary, unfashionable, gloriously human — is told that not seeing the value is a moral failure. I don’t want museums shuttered, athletes muzzled or artists policed. I insist on the consent to speak plainly — about art, sports, bathrooms, protests, all of it — without the automatic slur that dissent equals hate. If a painting or a policy is truly strong, it can handle straight talk from people who wash their own car and change their own oil.
If that sounds uncouth, hand me the overalls. Where I come from, we have a phrase for costumes everyone pretends to see: That dog won’t hunt. And if the emperor wants to strut down Fifth Avenue in the altogether, fine — just don’t demand I compliment the tailoring.
Alan Webber, a Bourbonnais resident, can be reached at awebber@anwebber.com.