Let yourself be surprised

There is this German saying which cute Tanja taught me once and changed my perception of life: Lass dich überraschen! Let yourself be surprised!

I remember once trying to get to the Boros Sammlung, a conspicuous art collection housed in a bunker in downtown Berlin. The people were surprised by a big rock blocking the door. Most of them were older Germans and they got really pissed off. My reaction was, according to the savvy saying, to start laughing: the rock was an element of chaos which was messing our standard daily life. As it happened, it was an art work itself.

That's one of the reasons why I love philosophy and art: it forces you to see things the other way round.

That's exactly the spirit behind this new art work on the façade of a museum in California: a peeing dog. That's what art is allegedly to do, right? To provoke and surprise, to interrupt your train of life.

Richard Jackson, Bad dog (2013)