dunce

During the Iran-Contra scandal, of which Reagan insisted he didn’t recall anything, Phil Hartman played him as an amiable dunce when Jimmy Stewart is visiting, but behind closed doors he’s orchestrating the whole scam: computing bribes in his head, speaking Farsi.

It’s about as academically relevant to today’s students as Sadie Hawkins Day, and as necessary as a dunce cap.

“That’s where the wall drawings and the early sculptures, like ‘Big Dunce,’ came from.”

Education and school references have long peppered his work, as in 1989’s “Big Dunce,” the earliest work in the MCA show, a sculpture of a tall white hood, meant to evoke the Ku Klux Klan, on top of a stool in a corner.

If you do think that he could, please step forward and claim your complimentary dunce cap, and infuse it with your own naivete.