Rumpeltonianism: The End of Everything I Hold Dear

 Rumpeltonianism: The End of Everything I Hold Dear

By Gordon Weft
Canvas Purist Monthly, March 2025 Issue
Opinion / Dissent / Damage Control

It was bound to happen.
We live in an age where irony is mistaken for insight, and talent is considered a liability. Out of this cultural compost heap rises Rumpeltonianism—a movement so defiantly incompetent, so allergic to refinement, that it dares to wear its own mediocrity like a badge of honor.

I attended the so-called “exhibit” last month. I use the term loosely. It was more a slideshow of pixelated scribbles projected onto a bed sheet, accompanied by an audio track of dial-up sounds and someone chewing with their mouth open.

The works—if one is generous enough to call them that—boast names like “God Gave Me This Mouse” and “Ctrl-Z Is My Religion.” Each piece is a masterclass in the art of not trying. Jagged lines. Uncorrected mistakes. Color palettes selected with the care of someone falling asleep on their keyboard. One canvas featured what appeared to be a crudely drawn otter with the caption, “Monday.” I still don’t know what it meant.

The manifesto, which I refused to finish, likens their process to rebellion. Rebellion against what, exactly? Taste? Skill? The basic understanding of shape?

At its core, Rumpeltonianism is not a style—it is a shrug. It is what happens when apathy is mistaken for authenticity, when every digital smudge is declared sacred. It is the celebration of the undone. A kind of gleeful anti-discipline, wrapped in the false nobility of “accessibility.”

I have taught art history for over 30 years. I have defended abstraction, championed minimalism, and even once argued in favor of a man who painted exclusively with mop water. But this—this is different. This isn’t challenging the system. It’s clogging it.

Rumpeltonianism is not the future. It is the garage sale of forgotten techniques and pixelated delusion.
And the worst part?
People are starting to like it.

God help us.

— Gordon Weft
Senior Contributor, Canvas Purist Monthly
Author of “Beyond the Brushstroke: Rescuing Real Art in the Age of Apps”