Hartman's Masterpiece Up For Bid

(CBS)  The following is a weekly 60 Minutes Wednesday commentary by columnist Steve Hartman.

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Inside this box is a piece of art –- a piece of conceptual art that I concepted about six years ago.

Friends who've seen it say it's actually quite bad, which is, of course, how it ended up in a box.

But now, I'm wondering if maybe I should give it a second chance, especially after seeing this giant orange car wash, or whatever it is they just put up in Central Park.

The artist Christo calls it "The Gates."

I can't do a painting, but this kind of thing, I think I can do it.
I'm pretty sure that I once created conceptual art.

This is my masterpiece: a wrinkled T-shirt that I found at a men's clothing store. What inspired me to frame it was the price tag: $180. I asked the salesman why so much, and he said, "because the wrinkles don't come out."

The wrinkles don't come out. I stared into those wrinkles and saw a work of art.

I wrote about it that night in my journal: "For the first time ever, I decided I had discovered art. All my life I'd been told that art is something that forces you to think, makes a statement, evokes emotion. The pricey piece in front of me did all that."

So, I bought it and framed it. But did I make art or not?

To find out, I went to Artforum magazine, the Bible of the art world.
The publisher is Knight Landesman. He doesn't normally critique emerging artists, but he made an exception for me.

Hartman: Take a look, take it all in. Let me know what you think.

Landesman: It's a nice piece of art. You could hang it with pride.

Hartman: Would you hang it in your house?

Landesman: No. It wouldn't appeal to me. It's not colorful enough. I'm a lover of color.

Hartman: You don't like white necessarily?

Landesman: Yeah, I don't. ... I think it's a good beginning, and it's all it is.

Obviously, Landesman was trying to let me down gently and I was about to pack it in, when I picked up a copy of Artforum, and just happened to see an ad for an art show.

"You should go see the show," says Landesman.

I did.

How much did one piece of art, a white piece of clothing, cost? $22,000.

There, I found the answer to my question. It turns out a white undergarment is not art. Art is a white undergarment in a box next to a funnel.

Still, I'm not convinced my T-shirt is totally without artistic merit.

That's why I'm going to start taking bids on eBay. All proceeds go to charity.

And if we get enough response, maybe next year they'll let me cover Central Park -- with one great big wrinkled T-shirt.