et voila

market vibes

January 2, 2025 … )

“You give me ten thousand dollah. I make you million dollah, or you lose everything!” Claude Hwang, 1975

Andre Malraux wrote a book in the 60s called Museum Without Walls, meaning modern media made it possible for the world to see the Mona Lisa without going to Paris. The salons of art were as free fresh air, he said. Marshall McLuhan said, “The Medium is the Message.” However, in those days of innocent discovery, empowerment soon became alienation. The realities of tragedy and struggle became eight-by-ten glossy images of disconnected titillation. Empathy was anesthetized by the sheer quantity of information, and influence took its place with twitter and clickbait. There was a time when poets and painters carried the messages. Not anymore.

In the news:

As the clocks of time nipped at the heels of a reluctant 2024, citizens minding their own business riding home on a train, or homeless and huddling from the winter, were set afire and murdered by sociopathic migrant criminals. This went on X in minutes. Global iterations of mass vehicular slaughter populated peaceful gatherings of families for Christmas. Et voilà. McLuhan’s messages, artfully hung on the walls of Malraux’s museum. Shocking for more than a minute? You decide.

The artist’s intent has always been the same. The message gets into your head and surges your dopa. However, if novelty is a precondition to orgasm, and familiarity breeds contempt, clickbait is numbing not terrifying! The morons who keep trashing civilization are so ignorant and medieval they have no clue they are just the next click. And that takes me to my point this morning about markets.