[Slowly, and with mounting joy] Hey, My Kid Could Paint That

[A person enters an art gallery and spends several minutes looking quizzically at a piece of non-representational art. They speak.]

Hey – Hey. [slowly, and with mounting joy] Hey! My kid – my kid could paint that! Come quick! Somebody – please – anybody! Can you hear me?

My kid could paint that! I was just looking at this and I was overcome by the most powerful sensibility – God, I need a minute – will you look at that, I'm weeping – Christ, I haven't done that in two years! I just realized, looking at this, and thinking about my kid, who isn't even here right now, that's the crazy part, looking at this non-representational art has placed the image of my own child at the forefront of my brain – what a remarkable experience – and I realized, just now, that my kid is capable of producing similar art, the kind that's also capable of evoking unexpected and unpredictable connections in the heart and mind of each viewer! My kid could do that! Someone could be walking through an art gallery, with an open heart and curious eyes, and something my kid painted could do that to them! My kid is as capable of producing moving, complicated art as anyone else alive on this planet! There's nothing that can really separate my kid from the experiences of anybody else – which is maybe just another way of saying that there's nothing that can separate my kid from living? I don't know, but by God I had to tell somebody – I feel like I'm gonna bust open at the seams! My kid could do that! Isn't that wonderful news about my kid?

Do you know what I mean? I'm not trying to take anything away from whoever it was that painted this! I feel like I could kiss them – my kid could do what they do, and they could do what my kid does – and in a certain way that makes everybody my kid, and nobody my kid, all at the same time – there are no barriers between my child and art, is what I'm trying to say! There are no artistic traditions hidden behind a fence my child can't climb! This – this – my kid could paint this! My two-year-old could paint this!

Don't you think that's remarkable? Don't you think that's something worth crying about?

[Image via WikiArt]