Art... any way we can get it

Serbian village wants to erect a statue of Rocky Balboa as an inspiration to residents. "Zitiste has suffered serious damage from floods and landslides, earning it a reputation for being jinxed. Many of its residents have left the village in search of a better future." BBC 02/12/07

My friend, Ohio Greg, used to despise the mention of Bob Ross, not unlike my common reaction to Thomas Kinkade. I believe both artists to be the worst form of kitsch, as many of you have heard me spout intermittently throughout the past 300-some-odd blog posts. However a few years back, Greg changed his tune about Bob Ross’s “happy little trees” when he encountered an old woman at a University Museum exhibition, whom adored art and visited museums and galleries more regularly than even most professional artists could probably claim. She was in her early-eighties and wanted him to drop-by her home to see her collection of self-produced paintings. Greg scheduled an appointment and walked into a shrine to Bob Ross. After he lifted his jaw from the floor, she admitted that she was not much of a painter and it had taken years just for her to be able to copy Mr. Ross from the television; but she loved art so intensely and felt that if she could at least put paint to canvas she could for a moment understand the artists’ work she visits nearly everyday at the museums and galleries of Chicago. Years later, while discussing the strange encounter that threatened to tear the very fabric of the universe we understood; we agreed that if Bob Ross’s seductively influential afro allowed her this small moment of success – his work finally had a hint of respectability… or at the very least relevance. – DN