Nothing's better than the story of Barnett Newman's Voice of Fire.
One of the first cause célèbres of the populist Alberta flexing it's muscle at the federal level, Reform party Philistines loudly complain about the National Gallery purchasing the epic Newman piece for $1.8 million. Never is there a topic that a populist politician isn't an expert in with an equal measure of certainty and outrage in their opinion. Reformers and their backers (many evidently coming out of the woodwork in this thread), loudly mocked those so called experts, the national gallery curators, what with their PhDs in art history, for wasting taxpayer money.
Record scratch:
Fast forward to the present day. Voice of fire is valued at over $50 million, is considered one of the jewels of the collection, and a major piece of Newman's catalogue who's one of the to ten imminent modernist artists of the 50s-60s movement.
Maybe there is no moral to this story. But maybe, just maybe, some reflection rather than knee jerking would benefit some of the more strident among us.
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