From the magazine

Letters: The brilliant uselessness of art

The Spectator
EXPLORE THE ISSUE 22 February 2025
issue 22 February 2025

Wonderfully useless

Sir: Michael Simmons overlooks some scandalous examples of frivolous funding right under his nose (‘Waste land’, 15 February). A few minutes from our offices, there are several vast buildings, all lavishly subsidised by the taxpayer, whose sole purpose is to allow hordes of strangers to stare at rectangular sheets of fabric on which are daubed various colours and shapes – most of which quite wastefully replicate things that we can already see with our own eyes in the real world.

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