The word “weathervane” once described a politician whose opinions changed depending on which way the wind blew. Politics always has lots of those, as well as sleazebags, drunks, and fools. Now, we’ve got a universe of pols and bureaucrats who actually think we mortals can control the weather, of all things. Academics parrot the party line as they drink from the grant-money trough. Big corporations live off subsidies. Then there’s what I kindly call the “impressionable youth.” They’re programmed to lose sleep because they think they’ll burn to a crisp before they get to go to their senior prom.
Enough with medieval gloom and hubris-parading-as-expertise. Let’s think about actual weathervanes, which do indeed tell us which way the wind’s blowing, and focus on the art of weathervanes. The best exhibition I’ve seen in New York this summer is American Weathervanes: The Art of the Winds at the American Folk Art Museum, across the street from Lincoln Center.
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