Most public art seems little more than quirky decoration, compared with that thing in Chicago in a square of its own, right downtown. It’s worth noting Picasso couldn’t get a visa to visit the US, and Chicago, not NY, always seemed to represent America’s brutality to European artists. Even so, when Chicago accepted it for free they didn’t bother to think it might mean something. Though they won’t admit it, they’ve come to suspect implied criticism of some sort, and have been trying to figure a way to dump it in the lake for years. I wouldn’t pretend to know what it means, either, but it has the hunched shoulders, the bare ribs and splayed pelvis of canine starvation – humanity’s own notification of serious bad times. I’ve actually seen the homeless sheltering underneath to soak up the residual heat in the steel, as if it had been intended. I don’t agree or disagree – I’m just awestruck.
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