There's nothing quite like walking down by the Aquarium on a clear, bright weekend. The tourists come out in force--all shapes, sizes, and hues of humanity jostle for position in line to watch sharks and dolphins swim around in circles as they while away the monotony of their wait for death. People pack into the square and the surrounding attractions--historic ships, historic buildings, historic ice cream shops--all determined to be rewarded for enduring the endless lines, their own families, and the incessant nagging of beggars with a day of fanciful fun. All sadly forced to bring the Baby or Aunt Ruth along, complete with their appropriate wheeled accessories, filling everyone with good karma and the barely-suppressed dread of hauling them through minimum-handicapped-accessibility-requirements-met attractions for the rest of the day.
I'm not a big fan of the Disneyworld approach toward fun. Queuing for an hour for a two-minute ride is hardly a just payoff. Being herded through turnstiles and crammed into the sweaty armpit of a furious father of three screaming toddlers for the better part of a morning just to find that the attraction has broken and closed while you were in line leads to a ticket price's worth of frustration. The mass-market appeal of vacation getaways leads to the mass market amassing on once-secluded islands, dumped off of city-sized cruise liners, bringing along all the BS they were trying t leave at home--lines, beggars, and street entertainers willing to turn tricks for you and your children for a measly $20.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the one form of panhandling I find even more annoying than the toothless junkies rattling their change is the middle-aged pedophiles who squeak out disturbingly phallic balloon animals and cram them on your children's heads. You've seen them--anywhere there's a historic monument, youth attraction, or family-oriented exhibit, these obnoxious failed clowns are sure to settle upon the ticket plaza like flies on carrion. What makes them? I don't know. I can't know what level of derangement leads to Balloon Animal Guys without becoming one, and even I'm too stable for that.
These chain-smoking, child-molesting, pancake made up promenade performers take all kinds--some unicycle, some juggle, some just stand at the center of an interesting bricklaying pattern and shout--but their product is consistent: brightly-colored sausage links twisted into shapes that vaguely resemble household items, particularly with the addition of sharpie-drawn cartoon eyes. I'm sure countless books and instructional videos have circulated over the years to lead the plastic-snapping novice out of his mother's basement and into creepy, tourist-tormenting obscurity, but I doubt that many of them discuss the deeper and far more valuable function of this dumpster-doomed venture--youth exposure to post-modernist art.
Yes, friends and strangers, much as I hate them, balloon animals do clearly fit the criteria for minimalist sculpture--they strip away all the frill and detail of a composition to reveal its essence, its purest form. The muscle, hair, and slobber of a heeling golden retriever are reduced to a yellow dog-like contraption, complete with floppy ears and a distinctly Disney-knockoff feel. Still-life portraits of fruit can be implied by tying red, yellow, and purple tubes to your triplets' heads to resemble an apple, a banana, and a bunch of grapes. Even the subtle humor of ancient dramatists can be evoked with a few tight bends attached to a man's belt. Okay, maybe not so subtle, and maybe not outside the Aquarium. But at Fantasy Fest or something. Fact is, what brings momentary delight to your child's eyes at the completion of a balloon objet is not the air-filled tubes or the creepy guy blowing on them--its the rest of the composition that their minds have filled in for them. To you it's some clear plastic, the static off of which is gradually making your preschooler's hair stand on end. To the child its a kitten, exactly as it's meant to be. The child sees the negative space, the kitten that the lines left out, fluffy and pink and perfect.
This does not, by the way, excuse balloon animal hawkers pounding the pavement outside my house. If I want to visit the drugstore on a Saturday afternoon I should not have to fight my way through the swarm of plastic pirates with inflated parrots to get there. I sympathize with the parents who hadn't planned ahead for their child to covet the glistening gems in the artist's pouch, counting the money they're going to wind up blowing on whimsical nonsense that their brat will pop, lose, or dislike within minutes, watching the balloser pick his target and home in. My parents had the strength to say no at the time and I hated them for it...briefly. Then I got to see the turtles and it was all okay.
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3 comments:
1: I love the aquarium.
2: I love Disneyland.
3: Queuing? What, are you British?
4: I do not Like balloon Animal Guys (though I do like them better than I do clowns)
5: Sorry you live in a tourist trap.
Perhaps you should start your own side-gig as a Rope Knot Animal Woman?
I'll see you in Hell:
http://tinyurl.com/2qnq2x
The Aquarium is superlative.
I'm a tad unclear on how you know that the HorriblePlace performers are all pedophiles. In my day, they were merely struggling performer who had swallowed a *lot* of pride.
the folks at the aquarium around here are rather adamant about how its not an aquarium, its The Aquarium. i just go along with it 'cos its not worth fighting. Honestly I've seen about four balloon folks around the plaza, and while one is a serious performer--he wears good makeup, is witty, makes pretty good sculptures, and communicates with parents and children equally, the other three have been dirty, smelly, and crazy-eyed, scaring children. pedophiles? maybe not. but not people you want around kids.
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