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And no, writes author David Plotz, this exhibit has nothing to do with the politics going on there.

Here’s how he describes it:

Ellen Harvey’s “The Alien’s Guide to the Ruins of Washington, D.C.,” on display at the private Corcoran Gallery of Art until Sunday, is an exhibition that takes place in the future, after extraterrestrials have discovered a wrecked and depopulated Earth. The exhibit is their well-meaning attempt to understand why the late earthlings erected so many white, pillared buildings, especially in Washington.

The centerpiece of the exhibit is the alien’s pamphlet about the various ruins they’ve discovered in the city: “The Circle/Triangle Pillar Thing” (the Jefferson Memorial), “The Really Complicated Pillar Thing” (the Capitol), etc., accompanied by very earnest, and exceedingly wrong, alien-museum-curator speculation about the likely purpose of the particular ruin. Imagine what ancient Athenians would make of 21st-century academic articles about fifth-century Greek life, and you get some sense of what it’s like to read the aliens’ guide.

It’s a hoot.

Here’s some info about this “gloriously funny exhibition”: Slate.

More stories about art.

Photo credit: petrrgoskov – Fotolia.com