John Baldessari

John Baldessari is an artist and the author of Ingres and Other Parables, among other books.

A DIFFERENT KIND OF ORDER (THE THELONIUS MONK STORY)

There's a story about Thelonius Monk going around his apartment tilting all the pictures hanging on the wall. It was his idea of teaching his wife a different kind of order. When she saw the pictures askew on the wall she would straighten them. And when Monk saw them straightened on the wall, he would tilt them. Until one day his wife left them hanging on the wall tilted.