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I really appreciate the idea of striving for art that is initially meaningless. Allan McCollum has a point– it doesn’t really matter what the artist feels when creating, as society only values what the viewer feels in response to that creation. Art basically reflects whatever society commands it to reflect, regardless of the little person in the background responsible for its creation. So, in rebellion against a system which so blatantly victimizes those of the artistic realm, Allan McCollum decided to create art while feeling… nothing, The question is did he achieve his goal? I have to wonder what sort of emotions inspired him to create art without feeling. He created these psedo-paintings to rebel against society and society’s interpretation of art, which would imply that he was dissatisfied with said society. Usually being dissatisfied requires one to feel certain negative emotions towards a particular thing, which does indeed involve feeling emotion. Was he angry? Bitter? Something spurred his desire to create such sterile art… It seems to me that one would have to feel a great deal in order to want to create in essence an empty void. Doesn’t that in itself give his art meaning? Somehow that orignal idea of nothing kind of just morphed into something. When it comes right down to it, emotion and meaning can really be extracted from anything if you look deep enough. 
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