I thought long and hard about whether I should post this but even after a good nights sleep i’m still angered by this video. If you’re not familiar with Justin Bua he is an illustrator primarily focusing on urban imageries of dj’s, breakdancers, and other various hip-hop related imagery. What do we think of his work? Well lets just say you won’t find him featured in B/D anytime soon. But I digress.

Apparently Ovation TV game him a tv show where he gets to rattle off his opinions about all sorts of artists. The above video shows Bua questioning the legitimacy of Robert Ruaschenberg (one of the biggest and most influential artists of all time). This is absurd on so many levels that I don’t know where to start. For starters what the hell does Justin Bua know about art? He makes tacky posters that are suited for Spencers Gift shops, not legitimate galleries. Then there is the fact that he holds no degrees in art history or art criticism. He managed to graduate from Art Center with a BFA in illustration but I guess he must have slept through art history 101. How Ovation TV gave him this show is beyond me. Ovation usually does a great job with their arts programming but they made a terrible mistake letting this misguided and uninformed illustrator host a show called American Revolutionaries.

I hate to go off on a rant like this and get negative but the madness has to stop! You can’t mess with Rauschenberg and get away with it! I don’t care how much urban street cred you’ve got.I painted graffiti for well over 12 years and went to more Zulu Nation reunions than I care to admit but even when I was 16 years old I knew Robert Rauschenberg was one of the biggest innovators and contributors to contemporary art. One other sad tidbit in all of this is that Mr. Bua teaches at USC. Yes he actually gets to teach young artists about Rauschenberg’s “Innovative Mind Trickery!” It’s a sad day when you have to pay $56,813 to learn shit like this.