David Ostow’s cartoon is set in a museum, where a guide leads a group from a selection of dark and disturbing works to a collection of cheerier but banal paintings.
My first two captions highlight the stark contrast between the two sets of paintings:
- “These lack artistic merit but are far less depressing.”
- “Now for a palate cleanser.”
My final caption assumes the same artist made all the paintings and explains his transition from utter despair to naïve bliss: “And he painted these after he finally met someone.”
Now let’s see how you did:
Not many puns this week, but here’s a particularly good one: “Welcome to the Meh.”
A few weeks ago, The New Yorker contest featured a cartoon set in a museum and I made it to the finalists’ round with a reference to the prohibition against flash photography, which can damage paintings. This entry suggests that there may be limited exceptions to this prohibition: “Flash photography is permitted in this gallery only.”
The next two captions focus on the one youngster in the group and suggest that he could have been traumatized by the paintings in the first gallery:
- “Tell the kid he can open his eyes now.”
- “The child may open his eyes now.”
Several of you suggested that the two sets of paintings mark different phases in the development of the same artist’s work:
- “Now we’ll see three works from her Medicated Period.”
- “Stepping into the Banal Period.”
- “Next, we have his Prozac Period.”
- “After he went mad, he went insipid.”
- “Note the evolution from traditional oil to CBD oil.”
A related set of captions highlights the difference between the first and second group of paintings:
- “We now move from modern pessimism to maudlin optimism.”
- “From angst and gore to please, no more.”
The next four entries explain why the last three paintings are so much cheerier than the previous ones:
- “And then the artist started taking his medicine.”
- “Same artist, after rehabilitation.”
- “Same artist. Different meds.”
- “And then, he got a dog.”
Like I did, a couple of you suggested that the banal paintings are there to help people collect themselves after seeing such disturbing images:
- “I’ll give you a moment to decompress.”
- “Time to cleanse your palate.”
This entry, however, suggests that the last three paintings are darker than they initially appear: “Now before you start to relax, notice how these were painted in blood.”
And maybe dark is better than banal:
- “And this is the room for people who hate art.”
- “Now this will make you puke for a different reason.”
- “What’s interesting about this gallery is that all the paintings are terrible.”
Some people, of course, like banal art:
- “This is the section for people who don’t know much about Art, but who know what they like.”
- “And in this gallery, some pictures you will actually understand.”
One of you submitted a political caption that brought back memories of my youth. Years ago, I worked at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. In the summer of ’89 I returned to D.C. and visited my former boss at the Corcoran, Ellen Tozer, who showed me a catalogue from a planned exhibition called “Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Moment.” Mapplethorpe was openly gay and had recently died of complications from AIDS, and the exhibition included some of his most explicit photographs. It also received government funding, so the Republicans railed against it. The Corcoran gave in to the political pressure and canceled the exhibit, a decision that generated even more controversy. That’s what I remembered when I saw this entry: “Our new exhibit was funded exclusively by Republicans.”
I’ll conclude with two more clever critiques of the dog, sailboat, and ice cream sundae pictures:
- “And now for some of my paintings.”
- “And these came with the frames.”
There were so many terrific entries this week that choosing a winner is particularly hard. Because I love the idea of a museum buying frames that come with disposable pictures as inserts, just like the frames I buy for my personal photographs, I’m going with, “And these came with the frames.”
ENTER THIS WEEK’S CAPTION CONTEST
Lawrence Wood has won The New Yorker’s Cartoon Caption Contest a record-setting seven times and been a finalist four other times. He has collaborated with New Yorker cartoonists Peter Kuper, Lila Ash, Felipe Galindo Gomez, and Harry Bliss (until Bliss tossed him aside, as anyone would, to collaborate with Steve Martin). Nine of his collaborations have appeared in The New Yorker, and one is included in The New Yorker Encyclopedia of Cartoons.