#pope l.

"The artist, Pope L., possessing a Master of Fine Arts degree from Rutgers, traversing the Whitney Independent Study Program, and holding a professorial position, appeared to engage in a form of performative masquerade as an 'outsider artist’ and homeless Black person. The term 'outsider artist' within academic circles appears, somewhat paradoxically, to be construed primarily as a Black artist possessing formal educational credentials but having not attended elite institutions such as Yale or Cooper Union. This interpretation departs significantly from the conventional understanding of 'outsider' artists, who are typically unaffiliated with formal artistic education and operate outside established institutional frameworks."

i like a select few of pope l.’s work but most of his work was anti-Black af. nonblack people are posting him passing for social currency. they are mourning him because he a, is like David Hammons and did white conceptualism better than them and b, because they lost one of their favorite art tokens. they lost one of the artists they used to say whenever someone asked them about a Black artist they like, they are mourning the idea of him, not even him