That word 'funny' always makes me feel uncomfortable. Because if

The words of John Baldessari—“That word ‘funny’ always makes me feel uncomfortable. Because if I were trying to be funny, I would be something like Bill Wegman—he really tries to be funny. I don’t try to be funny. It’s just that I feel the world is a little bit absurd and off-kilter, and I’m sort of reporting.”—speak to a truth both artistic and philosophical: that humour, when born of truth, is not a performance but a revelation. Beneath his humility lies the timeless understanding that art—and indeed, life itself—is not about invention, but about perception. To the one who sees deeply, the world reveals its strange balance of beauty and absurdity. Baldessari does not call himself a comedian, for his laughter is not crafted; it is discovered. He is not mocking the world—he is bearing witness to its divine crookedness.

To feel “uncomfortable with the word funny” is to reject the idea that humour must be manufactured or intentional. Baldessari reminds us that the absurdity of existence needs no embellishment. It is already here, surrounding us in every contradiction, every irony, every attempt of humankind to make sense of the senseless. He is, as he says, a reporter—an observer of the eternal misalignment between what we dream and what we live. His discomfort with being called “funny” is the discomfort of the prophet mistaken for a clown. What others see as comedy, he experiences as truth.

This notion is ancient in spirit. Heraclitus, the philosopher of flux, once said, “The world is both a comedy and a tragedy to the gods.” The wise have long known that laughter and sorrow are reflections of the same mirror—that when one sees reality as it is, laughter becomes a form of understanding, not amusement. Baldessari’s art, like Heraclitus’s philosophy, exposes the dissonance between the order we expect and the chaos that is. He paints and constructs with irony, but beneath the irony is awe—a recognition that the universe is at once ridiculous and sublime.

Consider the example of Francisco Goya, whose paintings of war and madness revealed not humour in the conventional sense, but the dark, absurd laughter that lives inside suffering. In his Los Caprichos series, Goya portrayed the follies of man—priests, nobles, lovers—all caught in their self-made illusions. His goal was not to be “funny,” yet his art provoked both horror and bitter amusement. Like Baldessari, Goya was not performing satire; he was reporting on the absurd theatre of humanity. He understood, as Baldessari does, that truth itself is sometimes so irrational that the only sane response is laughter.

In this way, Baldessari’s philosophy calls us to a higher awareness of the world. When he speaks of the absurd and off-kilter, he is teaching us to see—not with the eyes of judgment, but with the eyes of curiosity. To observe life as it unfolds without trying to correct it, without forcing meaning where none exists. This is the artist’s path, but also the philosopher’s. It is the courage to stand before existence and say, “I do not understand—but I will not turn away.” For to witness absurdity without despair is an act of spiritual endurance.

From this wisdom, we learn a great lesson: stop trying to make sense of everything—learn to notice instead. The pursuit of meaning often blinds us to the wonder of chaos. When we demand coherence, we miss the fragile beauty of imperfection. Baldessari’s art teaches us that by simply “reporting” what we see—by embracing the strange, the humorous, and the broken—we find authenticity. Do not strive to be profound or amusing or wise. Strive instead to be present, and the truth you uncover will carry its own strange power.

So let his words guide you, as the ancients once listened to the sages of paradox: laugh not at the world, but with it. Let your life, like your art, be a reflection of what is—unfiltered, unpolished, yet alive with the shimmering light of awareness. For the world is absurd and off-kilter, and that is its beauty. In recognizing that absurdity, in reporting it honestly, you join a lineage of souls who have turned confusion into clarity and irony into insight.

Thus, the final teaching is this: truth and humour are not opposites, but companions. The one who dares to see the world as it is will always be mistaken for a comedian, because truth itself often appears ridiculous to those who live in illusion. So do not try to be funny, or wise, or profound. Simply see—and in that seeing, let the laughter of understanding arise, quiet and eternal, like the hum of the cosmos itself.