Not to pick on the Tate - but we were speaking of "crap" and this "perfect example" of the use of the phrase comes from an article, "The Nincompoop Prize," by John Derbyshire - a gentleman I don't know but would really find it agreeable to meet:

"The Turner prize, in case you don't know, is one of the most prestigious art awards in the western world, given every year by London's Tate Gallery for a body of work whose creator has demonstrated outstanding ability and originality. The winner then chooses an item to put on display. The prize is worth £20,000 (about $30,000). This year's award went to 33-year-old Martin Creed for an exhibit that consisted of an empty room with lights that flicker on and off every five seconds. Mr. Creed's previous exhibits include a scrunched-up sheet of plain typing paper, a piece of plasticine stuck to a wall, and neon signs bearing cheery messages. The award was presented Tuesday night by Madonna.
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"What do I think about all this? Well, first I think that the directors of the Tate Gallery, which receives funding from general taxation, should be locked up in prison and made to do hard labor scraping the rust off bolts for 20 years or so with nothing to eat but cold oatmeal porridge. Then I think Mr. Creed should be stripped naked, sprayed all over with bright blue paint, and made to run round and round Piccadilly Circus until he drops from exhaustion, after which he should be killed by some not-very-humane method. Then the Tate Gallery should be reduced to rubble by aerial bombardment, the rubble carted away to be used as landfill, and the ground sown with salt. Then the fools who pay good money to look at this "art" should be packed into boxcars and tipped off the white cliffs of Dover, and their mangled corpses left to be feasted on by dogs, crows and crabs.

"Oh, all right: In a free country, people should be left alone to ingest dog poop, if that's what they want to do. Cancel the boxcars. I do think, though, that the fact of a worthless fraud like Mr. Creed being able to attain fame and fortune with his absurd "works of art" should make anyone who cares about our civilization cringe and weep. It is all very well to say that people should be able to do what they like with their money (which seems nowadays to include your money and my money, too: "art" everywhere is heavily subsidized from taxation). But public awards like the Turner Prize are not private matters. They are statements that we (we, this culture; we, this civilization) make about ourselves, to the world and to posterity. The statement being made this week by the Turner Prize judges is: "We are a culture of driveling nincompoops, who would not know real talent, skill and inspiration if they whacked us over the head with a loaded pool cue." To drive home the point, to add insult to injury, they delegated the prize-giving to Madonna, a talentless self-promoter, the very epitome of everything trashy, stupid, dirty, meretricious (look up the etymology), mindless and antisocial in our godforsaken culture.

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"'There's one born every minute,' said P. T. Barnum. On hearing which, his assistant enquired: 'But where do all the rest of them come from?'"

Full text at The Nincompoop Prize

John