21 quotes
Belonging to a generation is one of the lowest forms of solidarity.
The Tradition of the New (1959)
The current demoralization of the art world is attributable at least in part to museum interference, ideological and practical, with ongoing creation in art.
Art on the Edge (1975)
Greatness in art is always a by-product.
Art on the Edge (1975)
Both art and the artist lack identity and define themselves only through their encounter with each other.
Art & Other Serious Matters (1985)
Art has arrived at the paradox that tradition itself requires the occurrence of radical attacks on tradition.
Art on the Edge (1975)
In the United States, revolts tends to be directed against specific situations, rarely against the social structure as a whole.
Art on the Edge (1975)
The artist is obliged to invent the self who will paint his pictures.
Art & Other Serious Matters (1985)
Only through apprehending, by means of present-day creations, how art is created, can the creations of other periods be genuinely appreciated.
Art on the Edge (1975)
The struggle to make an absolute statement in an individually conceived vocabulary accounts for the profound tensions inherent in the best modern work.
Art & Other Serious Matters (1985)
Abandoned by philosophy, politics, and sociology, historical determinism continues to hold out in formalist art criticism.
Art on the Edge (1975)
Imitation of the art of earlier centuries, as that done by Picasso and Modigliani, is carried on not to perpetuate ancient values but to demonstrate that new aesthetic orders now prevail.
Art on the Edge (1975)
The skills of the modern artist are the opposite of those of the craftsman: instead of acquiring techniques for producing classes of objects, the artist today perfects the means suited to his particular work.
Art & Other Serious Matters (1985)
Abstract art as it is conceived at present is a game bequeathed to painting and sculpture by art history. One who accepts its premises must consent to limit his imagination to a depressing casuistry regarding the formal requirements of modernism.
Art on the Edge (1975)
The story of Americans is the story of arrested metamorphoses. Those who achieve success come to a halt and accept themselves as they are. Those who fail become resigned and accept themselves as they are.
How much the work of an artist owes to an art movement to which he belongs can never be determined exactly, if only because the movement derives its character from the individual creations of its members.
Art & Other Serious Matters (1985)
The aim of every authentic artist is not to conform to the history of art but to release himself from it, in order to replace it with his own history. However the historical pattern is drawn, it will not fit the developing sensibility of the individual.
Art on the Edge (1975)
It is not logical for art to be logical. Art goes against the grain of the times as readily as it goes with it and at the very same moment. Instead of seeking the nearest exit, art responds to a new situation by uncovering a labyrinth of problems.
Art & Other Serious Matters (1985)
At a certain moment the canvas began to appear to one American painter after another as an arena in which to act-rather than as a space in which to reproduce, re-design, analyze or express an object, actual or imagined. What was to go on the canvas was not a picture but an event.
The Tradition of the New (1959)
For the artist, fulfillment of self consists not in marching in the ranks of the liberators but in being entered in the roll of the Masters. The artist tends to find himself in the position of a deserter from his social group — or, at best, one who collaborates, with secret reservations.
Art & Other Serious Matters (1985)
Not only were the minds of artists formed by the university; in the same mold were formed those of the art historians, the critics, the curators, and the collectors by whom their work was evaluated. With the rise of Conceptual art, the classroom announced its final triumph over the studio.
Art & Other Serious Matters (1985)