Time says, “Only 15 minutes, Warhol!”
That Billy Hogarth, what a riot. Here’s “Time Smoking a Picture” from 1761, a bit of a bash at art connoisseurs who even then regarded the work of any Old Master worthy of a good sentimental drooling over, no matter how bad, just because it’s, um, old. Time improves and mellows art, some still say today, and the folks at the Art Renewal Centre would seem to agree wholeheartedly.
William Hogarth (1697-1764), a direct linear ancestor of his compatriot iconoclasts the Goons and Monty Python, thought the notion inane, and thus portrayed Time perched upon a statue he’s already smashed to bits, blackening a painting with his very Dutch pipe like it was a Louisiana red snapper. The dismembered statue still manages to point at the waiting pot of varnish as Time carelessly slices a hole in the canvas with his life-reaping equipment. The quotation in Greek on the top of the frame (so I’m told by a usually reliable Greek) reads, “Time is not a great artist but weakens all he touches.” So there.
One other thought: Time’s butt looks like the butts Dali was always painting, doesn’t it?
