Now I don’t know if Jeff Koons has ever made a golden calf, but maybe he should. The golden calf has had symbolic meaning since the first was made, about 3500 years ago, out in the desert east of the sea. Seems Moses needed time to think, and went off into the wilderness for forty days – a European vacation. When he came back they had setted up an alter and on it placed a golden calf. They don’t describe it in detail, but it isn’t necessary. A bovine of shinny metal, even on Wall Street these days, always means the same thing – “We’re all in for the material world, wealth and carnality.” Moses took exception, because, he said, it would turn out badly. He suggested a list of simple rules he hoped would get people thinking about something besides money.
Seems we keep slipping back, and we pay the price. Thinking about money all the time turns humans into pigs, and commercial TV pours on vicarious sex and violence to seal the deal. Where’s Moses with his almighty authority to save humanity from winding up in the gutter, again, herded like sheep by great wealth with private security? You say he’s gone away, and no one would listen to him now, anyway? Maybe we’ll have to throw down the golden calf ourselves this time, and in its place establish an art that asserts human dignity has a higher value than yellow metal dug from the ground, made into the shape of a muscular phallus with horns.
No comments:
Post a Comment