Hit the Road, Whitney

I agree completely with the gentleman from the "hinterlands" of New York who deplores the artless, talentless visual cacophony of "modern art" produced by phonies who can't draw and have nothing to say or convey. Art "critics," for the most, likewise untalented and uncreative, feign insight into this childish trash, praising all; to do otherwise would be heresy in that high-nose bunch.

Obviously, no one need be inflicted with this nonsense or suffer exposure to it: Simply avoid it when it comes to Hinterland, Wherever. It's too bad that museums expend hard-won funds exhibiting, even purchasing, this faux art.

Given the heavy emphasis of symbolism that is in contemporary art, don't be at all surprised to see smaller crowds in the fly-over states, rather than at the coasts. Why? Art is a reflection of life, and frankly Norman Rockwell has a bigger following in Lincoln, Neb. than does Mapplethorpe.

Move the Whitney permanently to Portland, Maine. There is a striving, if not starving colony there that would love to give the effete a run for their money. My nephew paints in Maine. He would approve. Winslow Homer, were he alive, would likely approve. I would approve. What more need I say?

Mr. Green proposes getting contemporary art out of New York and into the hinterlands. To which proposition I respond: for heaven's sake why? It is bad enough that this civilization-killing, self-indulgent garbage gets the attention it does now. Why would Mr. Green want to inflict it on an even broader audience? For years New York City has served as a place where the aberrant can go to have their strange cultural tastes met. Let us hear it for the status quo. If New York agrees not to further inflict its offensive culture on us, we in the hinterlands agree not to force New Yorkers to listen to country music or eat Jell-O with marshmallows in it. Do we have a deal?