Responding to detractors of her new “sexed-up” self in her latest video, Miley Cyrus said, “They can think what they want. Those are people who are just close-minded and don’t understand art.”

So are we close-minded too because we don’t understand the new installation art named “The Witnesses” that we noticed this week by Kent Hall?

We like Art. We really do. But seriously, it needs to mean something. At first glance this piece of installation art looks like a collection of stones, or as one person here in the newsroom said, “it looks like someone punched a block of cement.”

As the university aims to beautify its campus and is spending a lot of money in commissioning these art installations, an attempt perhaps could be made to install art that is more immediately understood by those who populate this campus; namely us, the students.

A look at the Bird’s Nest art installation reveals it to be a sorry sight. There are weeds growing in it, the sides look decayed and moldy and certainly it is at odds with the restoration attempts to make the campus a new and improved place.

The Brain, on the other hand, has fared much better, and there are usually tour groups that go and see it. Also it seems easier to say “right next to The Brain” and have people understand you than have people look at you blankly and when you say “right next to Eye to Eye” (for those of you who are giving this editorial a blank look, Eye to Eye, is the art installation by Cartwright Hall).

Art is not meant to be meaningless. It may evoke different responses, but one response it probably should not evoke is indifference. Blank stares are not a good response.

And while the artists of these strange-looking hunks of rock and metal may say they have meaning, we don’t see it. Gone are the days when art made sense. Rembrandt, Renoir and da Vinci didn’t have to make their art incomprehensible. This stuff, on the other hand, would make The Mona Lisa frown.

The above is a consensus of the Summer Kent Stater editorial board.