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# Sliding Down the Slippery Slope
- URL: https://hyperallergic.com/benji-whalen-sliding-down-the-slippery-slope/
- Published: 2018-03-17T14:00:24.000Z
- Updated: 2025-11-24T16:10:42.000Z
- Description: The choice has come down to essential realities or a life of fantasy.
- Author: Benji Whalen
- Tags: Art, Drawing, Weekend, #wp, #wp-post, #image-position-hidden, #Import 2025-11-18 14:37 (2018)

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2018/03/whalen.jpg)

Benji Whalen, “Kaprowcchhshkshhhh” (2017), India ink, watercolor on paper, 8 x 10 inches (courtesy of the artist)

To find a way to draw during a political and moral descent, I can look to a painter working at a nadir, as Thomas Micchelli did at the [outset](https://hyperallergic.com/351635/drawing-in-a-time-of-fear-lies/) of this series by pointing to Max Beckmann’s “[Birds’ Hell](http://www.artchive.com/artchive/b/beckmann/birdhell.jpg?ref=hyperallergic.com).” Beckmann gives us overgrown, foppish birds, dealing out topsy-turvy payback to their subjugated enemies. Describing a different painting, “[Departure](https://www.moma.org/collection/works/78367?ref=hyperallergic.com)” (1932-33), Beckmann reportedly [said](https://www.nytimes.com/1984/08/19/magazine/rediscovering-the-art-of-max-beckmann.html?ref=hyperallergic.com) he aimed for “*departure, from the illusions of life to the essential realities that lie hidden beyond*.”

Instead, we have a president who chases a life of illusion. The hair, the cloaking suits, the hotels, the pageants, the constant talk of “winning” — they all belong to a preening surface. Artists aren’t the only ones who believe in what Beckmann called “*the magic of reality*.” But as a practice at this time, an artist’s pursuit of essence may be our best instinct and way forward.