George Scraps His Sculpture

Summary
George volunteers to create a piece of art for the county-wide art show, but can't decide what to make.

Plot
The episode begins with a fantasy in which the kids are visitors at an art gallery. Buster, as a French detective, bursts in and reveals that a painting is a forgery created by Le George. His copies are indistinguishable from the originals, except Le George always spills some of his lunch on them. Buster arrests Le George, remarking that Le George could not avoid being himself.

George Scraps his Sculpture

George is chosen to represent the class at the County Art Show. A few days before the event, he still has not come up with anything.

Muffy suggests doing something like Rodin’s The Thinker. George creates thinking moose, but does not like it.

Francine suggests a kinetic sculpture like one from Arthur Ganson. George makes one and nearly gets hit by it.

Buster shows George the Lincoln Memorial and Binky a statue of a ballet dancer.

After listening to Binky and Muffy quarrel over food, George complains to Carl that everyone has a different taste. In order to please everyone, he has created a sculpture out of scraps that he does not understand himself. Carl likes it, although it does not look like a train.

George and Carl put the sculpture down on the curb, where it is picked up by a recycling truck. George follows the truck to the city dump where he meets Mr. Frensky and Kevin Sampson, who is collecting material for his art. George recovers his sculpture, but it falls apart, so Kevin shows him the dump, where George is inspired by some old stuff.

George takes some materials home, but still has no idea what to do with him.

Resigned, George is about to use a gift certificate for art supplies that Muffy gave him, but then he sees a sign advertising a Kevin Sampson gallery. He goes inside and sees many sculptures made of trash. Kevin tells George, that he likes to imagine himself as a little bird flying over his creations to see them better. He also tells George that he should just be himself, since that is what his friends are counting on.

George has an idea. He asks Mr. Morris for the trash from Mr. Ratburn’s class and builds something out of it. He uses Kevin Sampson’s bird trick to examine it.

At the art fair, George presents a train which is made of trash that was used by his friends, e.g. wrapping paper from a gift Francine gave to Muffy for cat-sitting. George’s friends applaud. Wally says that the sculpture is not his cup of tea and George tells him that he is entitled to his own opinion.

Characters

 * George Lundgren
 * Kevin Blythe Sampson
 * Buster Baxter
 * Francine Frensky
 * Muffy Crosswire
 * Binky Barnes
 * Arthur Read
 * Carl Gould
 * Oliver Frensky
 * Nigel Ratburn
 * Brain (cameo)
 * Wally
 * Lydia Fox (cameo)
 * Ramon Molina (cameo)
 * Fern Walters (cameo)
 * Sue Ellen Armstrong (cameo)
 * Prunella Deegan (cameo)
 * Ladonna Compson (cameo)
 * Ed Crosswire (cameo)
 * Millicent Crosswire (cameo)
 * Bakery Guy (cameo)
 * Arthur Ganson (mentioned)

Trivia

 * Artist Kevin Blythe Sampson guest stars in this episode as himself.
 * Timeline: Carl's love of trains from "When Carl Met George" is brought up again.
 * The episode uses real life footage of several works of art.
 * This episode premiered on Mario Day and SML's Jeffy The Pirate
 * Carl's first speaking appearance in an episode since the Season 20 episode "He Said, He Said," as well as his first appearance in Arthur overall since the Season 21 episode "Arthur Takes a Stand."
 * This episode also marks Lydia's first appearance in an episode since the Season 21 episode "The Princess Problem."

Episode connections

 * In the cold open, several of the characters have their outfits from "Fountain Abbey."
 * Some of the paintings from Buster's fantasy in "Framed!" can be seen while George is painting in the cold open.
 * Francine suggests to George that he could make art similar to Arthur Ganson's. Ganson himself previously guest starred in Arthur in the episode "Muffy's Art Attack."

Cultural references

 * When Kevin Blythe Sampson is holding the box of hands at the recycling center, one of the hands resembles the design of 's hands.
 * The paintings in Le George’s studio are:
 *  by, 1889
 *  by Giuseppe Arcimboldo,1591
 *  by Leonardo da Vinci, 1495
 * The paintings in Inspector Buster’s study are:
 *  by Jan van Eyck, 1434
 *  by Giuseppe Arcimboldo, ca. 1590
 *  by Vincent van Gogh, 1889
 *  by Raphael, 1504
 *  by Claude Monet, 1888
 * The sculptures in the Kevin Sampson gallery are (from left to right):
 * Mother Oatman, 1999
 * The Cathedral of St. John the Divine, 2017
 * Red Stripe, 2014
 * The Golden Spike, 2010
 * The Kron-Printzen, 2014
 * USS Mr. Imagination
 * Papa Midnight, 2016
 * Venezia-African Jack, 2012

Errors

 * When everyone is cheering after George unveils his sculpture, Mr. Ratburn is missing his whiskers in one scene.