Stupid Is As Stupid Does

When I was a freshman in college, I couldn’t wait to take Sculpture 101. I was one of those weird art kids in high school. Four years in the honors art program had puffed me up about my own creative abilities. I was the proverbial big fish in the little pond, and my label in our small town school was the “artsy girl.” So, Sculpture 101 was my “fun” class in my poli sci schedule. It was supposed to be the class where I could relax my brain and just have fun. I should have taken bowling.

It didn’t help that my sculpture professor was a sexist pig. I’m no feminist crazy here, so when I call him sexist, you can take my word for it. He began the semester by drawing the “perfect woman” on the white board. Other than no head and enormous boobs, I don’t remember much about it. I was there to sculpt, who cared what kind of jerk taught the class?

I came to care very quickly. 18 years old and pretty cute, if I’m any judge of these things, I spent a good portion of the first few weeks being ogled by a man older than my own father. A man who looked down my shirt any chance he got. Not only that, but he hated anything I did.

I sculpted people and he yawned. I created impressionistic works, and he complained about how unoriginal I was. I made pots covered with monkey-men who had feathers sprouting from their heads; he shook his head and asked how I could fail art. I saw the work of my classmates and listened to his puffed-up opinions of his own artistic abilities. He used words I’m not sure he actually knew the meaning of to try and explain thoughts and feelings that I’m not sure he ever experienced. It was vapid pomposity and I was failing because I wouldn’t stroke his ego.

I was unsure of what to do. What could I possibly create which would live up to his falsely high standards? I sat in class that Tuesday and punched and pinched and poked at the clay creating an amorphous blob. No thinking, just staring out the window brooding a bit, and doodling in clay.

Brilliance! he said. Wondrous creativity! What could this masterpiece be?

I raised a quizzical eyebrow and said the first word I thought of, “Yellow.”

Yellow? he asked. This funny looking thing is yellow?

“It’s my interpretation of the color yellow as a form.”

He actually clapped his hands, the pompous fool. Clapped his hands as he stared at my chest. I saw no reason to correct myself and say it was my mental doodle. Yellow I’d said, and yellow it became.

The next week I created Red, and Green the next. I breezed through the semester by emptying my mind and creating nothing and then slapping a color on it and declaring it done. He was so sure that he knew everything that he showed how little he really understood.

My 9 colors made the student show. The professors exclaimed over the brilliance of my work. The other students were onto me. They weren’t fooled for a moment. “It’s an act, isn’t it?” I was asked again and again. “It’s not really anything but clever naming. Right?” One especially perceptive senior remarked.

The small town professors were so sure of what they wanted to see that they were unable to see the truth.

I learned a lot from that art class. I learned about pigs in authority and how it doesn’t change them, but makes them more obnoxious. I learned that I have no patience for fools, no matter who they may be. I learned that I’m pretty quick on my feet and can think of weird stuff and make it sound plausible.

Most importantly I learned about people and self-importance and how easily we can all be fooled. When we are unwilling to be humble, to admit that we don’t know, to seem less than the expert…that’s when some young pup will come along and sculpt the color yellow and figure out how foolish we really are. How much better it would be to be kind and generous, and always learning, and admit that we really know nothing at all.