Artists who do not stand up for their principles trade a piece of their authenticity. In this true story, I tell about my brush with selling out for a grade.

I had an instructor in my last year of art school who hated the fact that I liked to paint people.

He told me that it had all been done before, it was old fashioned, nobody cared, I was dumb, etc. etc...so I finally stopped bringing my paintings to class.

I had gotten really disappointing grades from him due to his biases, and could hardly contain myself through his laborious critiques of halfhearted sketches, kooky high-jinks and tom-foolery submitted by my fellow classmates.

When the final senior project was due, I was at a loss. What could I do to mess with this guy, I wondered. What could I do to get the grade I deserved?

I was driving a groovy old car at the time...

One morning while traveling to school on the freeway at top speeds, I heard a horrible sound and felt that something was dragging from my undercarriage. It sounded like this:

dink.....ka,ka,KA-BLAAAAM EEEEEEAAEAEAEAEKKKKKKK.

It was a sound from hell. I looked in my rear-view mirror. Sparks flew from behind me. Startled, I pulled over, jumped out and took a look under my car. It was my muffler.

It seems that my muffler had rusted loose, fallen and become a mangled, twisted piece of shrapnel as it dragged behind me. I pried the smoldering, blackened mess free and heaved it into my trunk so I could later get a replacement. I resumed driving.

Along the way I got the idea....

Yes.

I would submit it as a sculpture for my final project in my class.

Now, the way class critiques worked was like this: We all had to make an individual presentation for our projects, allowing the instructor to make his profound comments before a captive audience.

Critiques were grueling, lasting a full week.
When it was my turn, on the last day, I carefully, delicately placed the filthy muffler on the display podium in the middle of the room. I treated it as if I were handling the most important object in the world. Completely deadpan, and wordlessly, I scanned the room and waited. There was not a sound. It was like a game of chicken, where the first person to speak would be the loser. I offered no explanation, made no jokes about the mangled car part, which sat before them, twisted beyond recognition.

My professor spoke first:
"John, I feel you have brought something very thoughtful and quite breathtaking for us today." he said.

My fellow students suddenly chimed in, now that it was safe to do so. They told me how smart my use of negative space was, how compelling my use of texture was, how the "sculpture" symbolized sexual repression, or the gross evils of European colonization against the native cultures of North America... They wanted to know what materials I used, and why I chose sculpture as a method expression. Some students said it was kind of a relief to see me finally discard painting.

My professor, my nemesis, was pleased by my submission, and even winked at me. It was the sort of wink that said, "Good job, son. I knew you had it in you."

It was all I could do not to bust out laughing. That afternoon, I shared my joke with some friends. But the problem was, I knew in my heart that I had just become part of the Bullsh*t.

The next day, I made an appointment with my professor and denounced my "sculpture" as not being worthy of my best intentions. Instead, I offered up a series of paintings depicting the faces of homeless kids I had met on the streets of Hollywood a few months earlier. These paintings really meant something to me because of my connection to the subject, and it was a true use of my love for portraiture. I believed in them. They were authentic.

He hated them, I could tell, and was angered that he would have to change my final grade, from an "A" to a "C". He ushered me out of his office and rolled his eyes ...snorting a disdainful laugh.

But it was O.K.

I could live with that. And I did.