"Has anyone here ever been shot by a paintball?" It’s an interesting question to ask a group of nine-year-olds. But I suppose they’re standing in front of Wafaa Bilal’s Domestic Tension (2007), and I suppose the gallery guide is looking for a way to connect the artwork to their lives.

I’m driving down Piasa Street in Alton, on my way to a café to grade my students’ papers, when I see hundreds of people in white shirts standing on the sidewalk on either side of me. Alert to the political moment, I understand that I have driven into the middle of a memorial for Charlie Kirk.