A song by Seraphino Aurelius Belladonna
Thou Hast Affixed Fruit to Plaster
Seraphino encounters a banana taped to a wall and discovers that bewilderment has acquired a curator.
- From the album
- As It Ought to Be
- Album sequence
- Track 3 of 14
- First released
- Running time
- 4:21
The matter at hand
What the song concerns
A gallery visit confronts Seraphino with fruit affixed to plaster and an audience insisting that the object’s importance can be understood only through an increasingly elaborate explanation. He applies a brutally simple test: if a masterpiece cannot speak without a sermon standing beside it, perhaps the sermon is doing the work.
The satire is aimed less at experimentation than at prestige used as a substitute for judgment. By eating the artwork, Seraphino accidentally creates the evening’s most discussed performance and proves the institution capable of absorbing even its own ridicule.
In his own estimation
Seraphino, upon its composition
I entered the gallery prepared to be instructed and found a banana secured to a wall by means more commonly employed upon damaged parcels. A gentleman explained that the fruit represented commerce, decay, appetite, and several other matters the fruit itself had neglected to mention. His explanation was lengthy enough to make the banana perish from embarrassment.
My objection was not that art must be conventional. Art should surprise, disturb, seduce, and occasionally offend. It should not, however, require a hired interpreter to assure the room that nothingness is profound. I ate the exhibit because it had ceased to be visually nourishing. The curator called this an intervention. I called it luncheon.
“A masterpiece needeth no sermon. It speaketh for itself.”
The complete text
Lyrics
I entered a gallery seeking beauty.
I found a banana rotting upon a wall.
Upon the wall there hung a fruit,
secured with silver strand.
The nobles gazed with trembling chins,
as though God moved His hand.
The curator clasped his fingers tight
and whispered, "Do you see?"
I said, "Aye, I see thy breakfast...
where breakfast ought not be."
He said it speaks of hunger,
of commerce, time, and shame.
I said, "Good sir, it speaks of nothing.
'Tis fruit with a fancier name."
Thou hast affixed fruit to plaster.
Thou hast declared thyself profound.
But calling rubbish treasure
doth not make gold abound.
If this be art, then every stable
is a gallery divine.
And every heap behind the tavern
is a masterpiece of mine.
A chair lay upside down nearby,
entitled Mortal Grief.
A bucket full of gravel
symbolized forgotten belief.
A rope upon the empty floor
was Man Against the Sky.
I asked, "Where is the craftsmanship?"
He said, "That question proves thee blind."
He said the void confronts us.
He said the silence sings.
I said, "The void did no such labor.
Thou merely brought in things."
Thou hast affixed fruit to plaster.
The crowd applaudeth loud.
Each feareth to confess aloud
they know not why somehow.
If wisdom meaneth nodding
whilst pretending thou canst see,
I'd sooner seek philosophy
from ducks beside the sea.
I do not mock the painter,
nor the sculptor,
nor the poet.
I mock the fellow
who mistaketh laziness
for genius.
Art should stir the weary heart,
or sharpen honest thought.
Not dare the crowd to clap along
for fear of being caught.
If thy explanation towereth
higher than thy work below,
then perhaps thou wrote the sermon...
...and forgot to make the show.
The fruit had ripened thoroughly.
Its glory now had passed.
I thanked the host for luncheon...
...and ate the thing at last.
The curator cried, "What hast thou done?!"
The patrons gasped in fear.
Then critics hailed "Consumption! Loss!"
Best exhibit...
all year.
Thou hast affixed fruit to plaster.
Keep thy fruit upon the wall.
I'll take the painter, smith, and bard
whose craft outshines them all.
For beauty asketh labor.
Greatness never beggeth help.
A masterpiece needeth no sermon.
It speaketh for itself.
Further evidence