If a carefully ruled "X" constitutes the best of recent Minnesota art, perhaps the state should apply at once for federal aid. Obviously we must be a poverty-stricken area, at least in the field of art.

Anyone who has seen the prize-winning paintings in the current biennial exhibit of the Minneapolis Institute of Arts doubtless would agree with the derogatory comments of artist Fossum (April 25), plus those of critics Sherman and Morrison, and would deplore the apparently hasty and inadequate rebuttal by the institute's director (May 2).

I am signing this letter with reluctance, since it might be better to follow the provincial New York trend and merely at the end make my illiterate, though neatly drawn, "X."

→ John Locken, Minneapolis.

To the Editor: Anthony Clark's defense (May 2) of jurors in response to Syd Fossum's letter of April 25 is interesting but unconvincing.

How fortunate for the world that Michaelangelo

had the ability, the in-spiration, and the grinding perseverance to carve his famous David when he was the age of two of the jurors in the recent (and for most of us sterile) exhibit at the Minneapolis Art Insti-