"Haters Will Say This Urn Is Mid." — How a 77-Year-Old Curator Cracked the Code on Making Art Go Viral
A 77-year-old woman stands behind a 16th-century Florentine urn in the National Gallery of Art, looks straight into the camera, and says: "Haters will say this urn is mid, but they don't know we've clocked its tea."
2.1 million views. Three days. No paid promotion. No trending audio. Just a white-haired curator dropping Gen Z slang with the confidence of someone who's been studying Renaissance sculpture for four decades.
Her name is Alison Luchs. She's the Deputy Head of Sculpture at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. She's been there for over 40 years. And she just became one of the most-watched people on art Instagram — because an intern taught her to say "bussin" and the social media team hit record.
The videos are hilarious. She opens with "Chat, peep this" and delivers lines like "All fax, no printer, people have been remixing art from day one." She's deadpan. She's committed. And she clearly has no idea what half these words mean — which is exactly what makes it work.
But strip away the comedy and there's something real here. The National Gallery was trying to promote their Open Call — a program offering 50 artists $3,000 each to create short-form videos reinterpreting artwork from their collection. They needed a way to reach younger audiences. So instead of a polished press release, they let a 77-year-old curator be herself... with a script written by people a third her age.
The result? The most engagement the museum has ever gotten on a single post. By a landslide.
Now here's what this means for you. Most artists I talk to tell me some version of the same thing: "I'm awkward on video." "I don't know what to say." "Nobody wants to watch me." Sound familiar? Right?
This woman has the exact same disadvantages you think you have. She's not a content creator. She didn't grow up on TikTok. She has zero "influencer energy." And she crushed it — because she was authentic and the format was unexpected.
You don't need to learn Gen Z slang. You don't need to be funny. You just need to stop performing and start being the person who knows their craft so well that people can't look away.
Alison Luchs didn't go viral because of the slang. She went viral because you could feel 40 years of expertise underneath the comedy. That's what made people stop scrolling.
What's YOUR version of this? What's the unexpected format that could make your work impossible to ignore?
https://people.com/art-curator-goes-viral-using-gen-z-slang-to-explain-art-11926985
Well, for one it certainly proves that having a sense of humor about art and your works certainly helps..I think artist can be very very serious about wanting to be seen and promoting their views and this is just an example of how to reach a crowd that doesn't necessarily get that right away.. so lighten up everyone, and have a sense of humor about who you are what you are trying to accomplish as well..we all need to laugh about ourselves and the purpose and meaning of art sometimes..but this is just my two cents.. take it anyway you want..
The sense of humor in this case, as ridiculous as that was (by design!). Make the difference between nobody seeing and and 20mm seeing it. Binary in that case.
Creativity in marketing is no different then the creativity in your work; it makes all of the difference.
Well Patrick, I would agree... that having a sense of humor.. in almost all things creative helps.. certainly there are times to be serious and times to laugh.. especially at oneself..I think my point was more generally focused on anyone out there that would tend to take themselves seriously to a fault..I mean the old adage is always true. If you can't laugh at yourself then who can you laugh at.. and on a deeper note a sense of humor also helps bridge the gap between light and shadow..pain and joy..tragedy and triumphs not only in oneself but in others as well.. and so those are my thoughts for the day on this.. thanks for the response #poertyandart