Hello Darkness! The Official Blog of Helen Keller

Folks, this could very well be the most controversial Comment Corner ever. Over time, we've shared some laughs at the thought of making retards chase frisbees, giggled to the image of a man in a wheelchair skidding out of control going down an icy hill, shared a tender moment hoping for the day that Ellen Degeneres' make-up splits open to reveal the withered remains of a gonorrheic horse cervix in the terminal stages. "Let's go" she would wheeze, and we would. Yes, we've just about travelled through everything together.

But today, we've got to face an ugly reality. An ugliness what strikes at the very core of being an artsy-fartsy pretentious patriot. That is, labelling the Group of Seven as anything more than being an over-rated bunch of pine-tree munching hacks who reduced turn of the century impressionism into oily smears of nature-barfed crap. And I include the token French guy added after Thomson's death AND Emily "Vanishing Culture, Nowhere to be Found Talent" Carr in the mix.

Franklin Carmichael

Franklin Carmichael painted with such crass impressionism you'd think he was auditioning for the role of token autistic. Despite being a founding member of the Group, he only ever really managed to paint sweeping hills. Every fucking time another sweeping hill. Apparently hills were the only thing dipshit here ever saw and they seem to haunt his every brush stroke. The Upper Ottawa is a painting of a stark tree in front of, guess what? Rolling hills of rock! The worst part is that Carmichael could never really summon the talent to differentiate himself from the low-class barf being sold on children's placemats. Want to be the next Carmichael? Get yourself a brush, some oil (preferably fucking green) and start to smear as many arcs as you can across the canvas. Once you're done smearing, throw a dart at a map of upper Ontario and presto bango, you're a Canadian legend.

Tom Thomson

Not all of his work was bad. Logjam sucked ass. Logjam sucked so much ass it sucked the hair from Arthur Lismer's forehead and blew it out Thomson's ass. Logjam sucked in the shittiness that would be the movie Project X starring Matthew Broderick and propelled it back in time, pausing to deflect a bullet into JFK's squash before materializing in the form of an incomprehensible oil painting of a Jenga crash that is Logjam. Then he drowned. Then the Group of Seven formed. Fucking sucks to be Tom Thomson.

And Logjam really sucked. Jack Pine too.

Here's a tip for viewing Thomson paintings. Since they're oil-based, you need to back up to fully realize what he was painting. As a matter of fact, the further back you go from them, the better they get. As a matter of fact, Tom Thomson's paintings became glimpses into the eternity of the universe by the time I got home from the gallery and turned on the Leaf game.

Lawren Harris

Okay, I like Lawren Harris' work. But he was an ugly son-of-a-bitch in desperate need of a haircut.

A. Y. Jackson

When Jackson painted urban buildings, he certainly drew influence from Harris and didn't suck so much. When he painted the Canadian wilderness, he began to channel into him the dead spirit of Thomson. That is, depressing at times.

True story: I overheard these two pretentious cock-bitches snaggering to each other in the fart-language vernacular peculiar to "artistes". One of them actually said that "Red Maple" was better than it looked. I was stunned by the impossibility of the statement so I flattened her with a right cross to her temple, thus saving the universe from imploding in on itself in a flurry of overwrought metaphors and Starbucks. God smiled.

Frank Johnston

Arguably the only one with any real talent, at least Johnston painted with some idea of ever moving beyond the boring world of brown and green oil impressionism. Then the stupid fat bastard discovered the wonder of light on snow. Yup, if you could ever imagine devoting your life to painting light on snow, you'd have Frank, sorry Franz Johnston's career. How this piggy world-eater made money in his lifetime I'll never know. Perhaps he cashed in on his remarkable likeness to Taft.

I heard a rumour the two of them ate a big chunk of Algonquin Park and were banished. Three years later, Johnston shit a piece of Thomson's head.

Frederick Varley

Frederick Varley couldn't paint a fucking proper portrait if he had Da Vinci helping him, a head start and three wishes plus a small brush made from Satan's pubes. Honest to God, Varley was the least talented prick of the bunch. Stormy Weather is a terrible painting. Granted, it's no Logjam, but it's close.

When he wasn't ruining people's faces, he was taking impressionism to bold new lows. If Carmichael were considered a genius for painting rolling goddamn hills, Varley was his crippled understudy, able to eke out a few words, keep from shitting himself unless it was with brown oil on canvas. Landscape #1 is the visual equivalent of passing out to the colour brown.

Avoid Varley the same way Varley avoided success or good portraits.

J. E. H. MacDonald

Surf Pattern. Just go look at this fucking thing and tell me you couldn't have painted it too even if you had suffered a direct blow to your ribs with a runaway Pontiac Laurentian with an oversized novelty hood ornament. That guy in the wheelchair skidding out of control on the icy hill we laughed at earlier made a more spectacular show of art when he slid into the side of parked taxi at full-speed like a human screaming turn-table.

Check it out. "lkasjdflkasjdflkajsdflk;" There, that is more art than MacDonald's Surf Pattern.

Next time your child drags home some of his craptacular class artwork, mail it to the National Gallery and tell 'em you've got a replacement for Surf Pattern.

Arthur Lismer

Fuck him. I'm done writing.

And there you have it folks. An ugly reality faced here at the Comment Corner. Unlike say, Gangstalking who recently came back from a paranoid drug-fueled trip to Walmart where she threw carmats at a child browsing the Spiderman costume display rack. His crime? He was humming the Spongebob Squarepants theme song which is also a coded message to Masonic/Knights Templar gang-stalkers telling them that the key jingling begins in 12 minutes and 12 seconds.