Trompe l’Oeil or How to make a fool of one’s self

This weekend I went to see a Trompe l’Oeil exhibit. Despite what it may seem from the spelling, it has nothing to do with trumpets, but rather with art. “What, you’ve never heard of Trompe l’Oeil??!!??!” This was the response of my wonderfully artistic friend Sarah when she heard the rather blank tone in my voice after she pronounced that she was coming here to see a Trompe l’Oeil exhibit and that it should be just wonderful. For the uneducated (of which I was so recently a part) ‘Trompe l’Oeil’ means, literally, “fool the eye”. This means it was a bunch of stuff lying or hanging around, that looked like one thing, but was actually something else. For example, my favorite work was a sculpture that looked EXACTLY like a roll of toilet paper. There were also paintings which were very similar to still-lifes, but apparently were not. (of course not! They were Trompe l'Oeil!) It was a very enjoyable exhibit, but to my non-discerning eye it meant one thing: it was an art exhibit evilly designed to make me look like a fool.

In the first room, I circled around looking at pictures that looked like they were of masking tape, but were actually painted to look like that and clay tools that were very realistic and usable-looking when I noticed a blank spot on the wall. “How interesting” I thought to myself. “I wouldn’t think they would need to take down a painting to fix it up on a traveling exhibit that is leaving in a few days anyway.” Then I shuddered, “Ugh” I thought to myself “A spider. How could a spider sneak into a museum? Maybe I should tell someone about it, so they can kill it.” Then I looked at the plaque and realized that the piece artwork was entitled “Daddy Long-Legs”. Well, it really DID fool the eye…(and the fool…)

The climax was definitely in the final room. I had been inspecting all the paintings and sculptures that were done with varying degrees of success as to their object when, in the corner, I spotted a very good piece. It was on a stand and looked like a box – the type computer paper might come in, and a mug full of pencils. I went and inspected the box closely and was thinking various things like, “This is amazing! It totally looks real! How do they DO that?!?!” when I realized it WAS real and I was supposed to vote on my favorite of 2 paintings and stick my answer in the box.

This may be my all-time biggest "stupid moment".