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Jeffrey Deitch

Jeffrey Deitch Quotes

Art dealer

Jeffrey Deitch is a renowned art dealer, born in 1950. He has over three decades of experience in the art world and has served as the head of several art galleries, promoting contemporary art on a global scale.

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Famous Jeffrey Deitch Quotes

“I was a fan of Andy's since I was a small kid. I recall seeing an ad of famous people on an airplane together. It was caricature drawing. There was Muhammad Ali, there was Miles Davis, and there was Andy Warhol. I had a fascination with him since I was little.”

People Littles Kids Together Seeing Fans Drawing Miles Ads Airplane Recalls Fascination Muhammad Caricatures Warhol

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“I started getting really curious about art. I read about the Dadaists and the Futurists and the Constructivists - those kind of movements which were reflecting the angst of the people of their times. Their work was trying to lead a movement. I began thinking about what was happening, with painting on the streets and painting on the trains as being similar but also coming from a real, pure space. It wasn't being created by academies. It was a spontaneous combustion of ideas that just happened.”

“To be in Brazil and see the work of Os Gêmeos or to be in England and see what Banksy is doing is pretty fascinating to me.”

England Fascinating Brazil

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“When I was looking at the Russian Constructivists, these agitprop artists actually painted on trains. It was a heavy influence. They were bringing art to the people, to the masses, and breaking it out of the clubbiness of the art world, which is a monolith.”

People World Art Artist Influence Mass Train Heavy Art World

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“We use the term pop in the art world, as in Pop Art, but we forget that its root is popular - popular culture.”

World Art Use Culture Term Forget Roots Pops Popular Culture Art World Pop Art

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“When skateboarding and punk merged, it really became a large teen subculture.”

Punk Skateboarding Subculture

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Ramp skating has become the most popular televised form of skating because they can constrain it. They can judge it based on what's happening within this box of a ramp.”

Form Judging Happenings Boxes Skating Constrain Ramp

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Street skating, which is what I grew up with, is completely free of rules. You can do anything. When I see a skater go by, I think, What is this person going to do here? It's the same with people who write, who make music, who draw, who make movies. Creative people tend to have all of those different avenues in them.”

People Thinking Writing Persons Different Can Do Creative Streets Grew Grew Up Draws Avenues Creative People Skating Skater

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“One of the interesting things about skateboarding and graffiti is that skateboarding exists in the documentation of an act.”

Interesting Interesting Things Graffiti Skateboarding Documentation

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Graffiti doesn't exist unless someone got a photo, because it's gone immediately.”

Gone Graffiti Curator

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“When you go out skating with your friends, you need one friend who knows how to take a good picture. Without the picture, there is no proof that you pulled the trick.”

Knows Needs Know How Proof Tricks Skating One Friend

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Skateboarding, like graffiti, will never be tamed. No matter how much they monetize it, no matter how big it gets, no matter how many companies are putting millions and millions of dollars into marketing it, it's always going to be some Mexican kid on a corner in Echo Park that changes the rules of the game.”

Matter Bigs Kids Games Company Millions Dollars Marketing Corners Parks Echoes Mexican Graffiti Tamed Skateboarding Rules Of The Game

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“I didn't know how to run a business. I was a terrible gallerist, the worst in history, possibly.”

Knows Running Know How Worst Terrible

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Street culture is punk, hip-hop, skateboarding, surfing, graffiti. It's like a massive global culture that is all tied together. But for so many years it was very geographic.”

Years Together Culture Streets Hip Hop Hips Hops Massive Punk Tied Surfing Graffiti Skateboarding

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Elizabeth Taylor is one of the great cultural icons. She is a part of our history and should be celebrated.… This presentation is very special for the community, there are so many people who want to understand this side of Elizabeth Taylor.”

People Want Should Sides Community Special Presentation Icons

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Disney is our contemporary landscape. The best art will reflect that and challenge you. Disney comforts you, whereas the best art shakes up your comfort level and perception.”

Art Challenges Levels Comfort Perception Contemporary Landscape Shakes Best Art

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“After pop art, graffiti is probably the biggest art movement in recent history to have such an impact on culture.”

Art Culture Movement Impact Pops Graffiti Pop Art

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Andy Warhol defined Pop Art.”

Art Pops Defined Warhol Pop Art

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Art dealing is when you're doing it as a business.”

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Art, film, fashion, music are all going on and interacting simultaneously. And L.A. is very receptive to that fusion.”

Art Film Fashion Receptive Interacting Fusion Art Films

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Celebrity has become, for better or worse, an art form. An artist can use themselves as a medium to become a celebrity as a walking work of art.”

Art Use Form Artist Walking Mediums Works Of Art

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Dennis Hopper is one of the great American lives.”

American Life Great American

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Effective fund-raising is based on relationships.”

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“From 1940 to the present, the art world and particularly Los Angeles, has undergone a transformation not unlike the Italian Renaissance.”

World Art Transformation Los Angeles Italian Renaissance Art World Italian Renaissance

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“I believe that an art exhibition can be engaging, fun and deeply intellectually satisfying and serious. These are not contradictory concepts in art.”

Believe Art Fun I Believe Serious Concepts Satisfying Engaging Contradictory Exhibitions

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Many of the museum directors who make an impact personally curate exhibitions.”

Directors Impact Museums Exhibitions

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Part of my agenda has been to support art that engages life with people.”

People Has Beens Art Support Agendas

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“There is a constant ebb and flow in art historical reputations. The reputation of even the greatest figures like Picasso are in flux.”

Art Figures Flow Constant Historical Reputation Flux Ebb And Flow

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“What I hope is I'll eventually be seen as an actual individual, not as some abstraction - an art dealer running a museum.”

Art Running Individual Museums Abstraction Dealer

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Every day you run into artists on the streets in SoHo or other creative people you want to do something with. There's nothing to match that chance encounter.”

People Want Running Artist Chance Creative Streets Encounters Creative People Soho Chance Encounters

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“I want to use whatever connections to get a super-outstanding Basquiat in the White House. It could be one of mine. It could be something that a friend owns.”

Want Use House White Mines Connections White House Outstanding Basquiat

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“In the 1970s when I started in the art world, no self-respecting artist would have stood in line to try to get on a television show. It never would have happened.”

World Trying Art Self Shows Artist Lines Happened Television Television Shows Art World

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“One of the biggest things happening in the art world is this idea of expansion. No one embodies this aspect of what art is becoming better than James Franco.”

World Art Ideas Becoming Happenings Art Is Aspect Things Happen Expansion Art World Franco Becoming Better

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Overall, I think any opportunity to expose people to art on a mass level - to have some kid in Oklahoma say to his mother, "I want to be an artist" - is a good thing.”

People Thinking Want Art Kids Mother Artist Opportunity Levels Mass Good Things Oklahoma

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“Sometimes you do a sound installation, and the first day or two it is very exciting. Then you are hearing this every day for a month, and it becomes like a torture.”

Firsts Two Sometimes Sound Months Exciting Hearing Torture Installation

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

“We're in a post-conceptual era where it's really the artist's idea and vision that are prized rather than the ability to master the crafts that support the work. Today, our understanding of an artist is closer to a philosopher than to a craftsman.”

Ideas Today Artist Understanding Ability Vision Support Masters Philosopher Crafts Eras Posts Craftsman

Author:Jeffrey Deitch

About the Author

Born: 1950
Known for: Art dealer
Quotes: 36

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