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Jerry Saltz

Jerry Saltz Quotes

Art critic

Jerry Saltz is a renowned art critic, born in March 1951. His career began in the 1980s, and he is known for his unique artistic perspective and critical style. Saltz's work covers a wide range of fields from modern art to contemporary art, and his reviews are frequently published in magazines such as The New Yorker.

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Famous Jerry Saltz Quotes

“You are always learning. At the end of each day, you know something you didn't know at the beginning. We're all learning on the job. This is true even when the thing you've learned is that you know less than you thought.”

Life Art Artist Imagination Education Creativity Learning Creative Process Learning Process

Book:How to Be an Artist

Source: How to Be an Artist

“Artistic qualities that once seemed undeniable don't seem so now. Sometimes these fluctuations are only fickleness of taste, momentary glitches in an artist's work, or an artist getting ahead of his audience (it took me ten years to catch up to Albert Oehlen). Other times, however, these problems mean there's something wrong with the art.”

Years Mean Art Sometimes Problem Seems Artist Quality Audience Taste Ten Artistic Momentary Fluctuation Glitches

Author:Jerry Saltz

“After too much art that made too much sense, artists are operating blind again. They're more interested in the possible than the probable, the private that speaks publicly rather than the public with no private side at all.”

Art Made Artist Speak Sides Too Much Blind

Author:Jerry Saltz

“All great contemporary artists, schooled or not, are essentially self-taught and are de-skilling like crazy.”

Art Self Artist Crazy Taught Contemporary Schooled Contemporary Art Self Taught Proficiency

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Rumors sound of galleries asking artists for up-sized art and more of it... Everything winds up set to maximum in order to feed the beast. Bigness is not all bad. There's something pleasing about large, well-lit spaces. But the bigness has also led to a narrowing of sensibilities, by making it very hard for any but the glitziest works to get traction.”

Wells Art Hard Artist Order Sound Space Wind Asking Beast Sensibility Lit Maximum Rumor Gallery Traction

Author:Jerry Saltz

“While the space for artists and curators has increased enormously, maybe, just maybe, that's left room for too many people calling themselves artists and curators who are simply not up to the term.”

People Artist Left Term Space Rooms Calling Curator

Author:Jerry Saltz

“A great artist has a unique vision...obsession. They are someone willing to fail flamboyantly.”

Artist Vision Failing Willing Unique Obsession Great Art Great Artist

Author:Jerry Saltz

“One argument goes that recessions are good for female artists because when money flies out the window, women are allowed in the house. The other claims that when money ebbs, so do prospects for women.”

Artist House Female Argument Window Claims Recessions Prospects Female Artists

Author:Jerry Saltz

“The debut show, “Second Lives: Remixing the Ordinary,” is supposed to be about how artists reuse humble or unusual materials. There’s good work here, but much of what’s on view is actually more about obsession and repetition: a couch made out of 3,500 quarters, a necklace composed of 100 handgun triggers. The building, too, seems caught between wanting to be an object of decorative delectation and making an architectural statement.”

“I don't want to hear at all what the artist thinks about his art. And I'm not writing for the artist. I'm writing for the reader, and I want to tell the reader what I think.”

Thinking Writing Art Artist

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Any critic will tell you that there are a few dealers where you get a little bit scared to go into their gallery, and that's unfair to them, to yourself, to the reader, and to the artist. But I just want to look. When I'm done looking and writing, I love talking to art dealers. They are so alive and interesting and amazing - from Larry Gagosian all the way on down.”

Writing Art Done Artist Interesting Critics Scared Unfair Dealer

Author:Jerry Saltz

“I think that a lot of artists have succeeded in making what I might call "curator's art." Everybody's being accepted, and I always want to say, "Really? That's what you've come for? To make art that looks a lot like somebody else's art?" If I am thinking of somebody else's art in front of your art, that's a problem.”

Thinking Art Problem Artist Accepted Being Accepted

Author:Jerry Saltz

“My job as art critic is to watch artists dance naked in public, and then I will, in turn, dance naked critically in public.”

Art Artist Critics

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Among living artists, George Condo may be the most embraced by the powers that be.”

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Calling a young artist 'great' these days can give one the heebie-jeebies: The word has been denatured in the past decade.”

Giving Has Beens Past Young Artist Calling Decades These Days Young Artists

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Elizabeth Peyton, the artist known for tiny, dazzling portraits of radiant youth, is now painting tiny, dazzling portraits of radiant middle age.”

Age Artist Known Middle Youth Painting Tiny Portraits Middle Ages Radiant Dazzling Peyton

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Few contemporary artists mined the space between the ordinary and the strange better than Orozco did.”

Artist Space Strange Ordinary Contemporary Space Between

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Giorgio Morandi's paintings make me think that artists may not totally choose, or even control, their subjects or style.”

Thinking May Artist Subjects Style Painting

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Once artists are expected to shock, it's that much harder for them to do so.”

Artist Harder Expected Shock

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Robert Rauschenberg was not a giant of American art; he was the giant. No American created so many aesthetic openings for so many artists.”

Art Artist Opening Giants Aesthetic

Author:Jerry Saltz

“The German ueber-photographer Andreas Gursky was the perfect pre-9/11 artist.”

Artist Perfect Photographer Andrea

Author:Jerry Saltz

“These days, newish art can be priced between $10,000 and $25,000. When I tell artists that a new painting by a newish artist should go for around $1,200, they look at me like I'm a flesh-eating virus.”

Should Looks Art Artist Painting Eating Flesh These Days Look At Me Viruses Flesh Eating

Author:Jerry Saltz

“I see artists bored by light-without-heat, irked at gigantic galleries' pushing out art-as-product, leaving behind the over determined for the undetermined, guided by interior voices and bringing us out of a long tunnel to new blueness.”

Long Art Light Artist Voice Behinds Products Leaving Determined Bored Heat Pushing Interiors Gallery Tunnels

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Only an artist as preternaturally acute and copacetic, as oddly visionary and just odd as Richard Artschwager would be able to lay out the whole course of human evolution and have it make some kind of sense while also seeming like a dazzling insight.”

Humans Kind Whole Would Be Able Artist Courses Evolution Lays Insight Odd Visionaries Seeming Dazzling Human Evolution

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Rumors sound of galleries asking artists for upsized art and more of it. I've heard of photographers asked to print larger to increase the wall power and salability of their work. Everything winds up set to maximum in order to feed the beast.”

Art Artist Order Sound Heard Wind Wall Increase Asking Photographer Beast Print Maximum Rumor Gallery

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Artists working for other artists is all about knowing, learning, unlearning, initiating long-term artistic dialogues, making connections, creating covens, and getting temporary shelter from the storm.”

Long Artist Term Knowing Creating Connections Storm Dialogue Artistic Long Term Temporary Shelter Shelter From The Storm

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Batty as it sounds, subject and style may choose artists, through some unfathomable cosmic means. How else to explain that even artists who enjoy what they do can be perplexed or even horrified that they're doing it?”

May Mean Artist Enjoy Sound Subjects Style Cosmic Unfathomable Perplexed

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Biennial culture is already almost irrelevant, because so many more people are providing so many better opportunities for artists to exhibit their work.”

People Artist Culture Opportunity Providing Irrelevant Exhibits

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Billions of photos are shot every year, and about the toughest thing a photographer can do is invent an original, deeply personal, instantly recognizable visual style. In the early nineties, Wolfgang Tillmans did just that, transforming himself into a new kind of artist-photographer of modern life.”

Years Kind Artist Can Do Modern Style Shots Originals Photographer Billions Visuals Modern Life Transforming

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Every movement that slays its gods creates new ones, of course. I loathe talk of the sixties and seventies being a 'Greatest Generation' of artists, but if we're going to use such idiotic appellations, let this one also be applied to the artists, curators, and gallerists who emerged in the first half of the nineties.”

Ifs Firsts Use Artist Courses Half Generations Movement Sixty Seventies Loathe Idiotic Curator Greatest Generation

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Galleries began growing in both number and size in the late seventies, when artists who worked in lofts wanted to exhibit their work in spaces similar to the ones the art was made in.”

Art Made Wanted Artist Space Numbers Growing Late Size Seventies Gallery Exhibits

Author:Jerry Saltz

“I don't often go to curator or artist walk-throughs of exhibitions. For a critic, it feels like cheating. I want to see shows with my own eyes, making my own mistakes, viewing exhibitions the way most of their audience sees them.”

Way Want Feels Shows Eye Artist My Own Walks Mistake Audience Critics Cheating Exhibitions Curator

Author:Jerry Saltz

“I don't plan out my visits rigorously, but I do have a list of about 125 New York galleries, alternative spaces, museums, and so forth that I visit regularly. That's the closest thing I have to a strategy: I go to a lot of places, many that artists don't visit.”

Artist Space Plans New York Strategy Lists Alternatives Museums Closest Gallery

Author:Jerry Saltz

“I love art dealers. In some ways, they're my favorite people in the art world. Really. I love that they put their money where their taste is, create their own aesthetic universes, support artists, employ people, and do all of this while letting us see art for free. Many are visionaries.”

People World Way Art Artist Universe Support Taste My Favorite Aesthetic Visionaries Dealer Art World

Author:Jerry Saltz

“I often find myself privately stewing about much British art, thinking that except for their tremendous gardens, that the English are not primarily visual artists, and are, in nearly unsurpassable ways, literary.”

Thinking Way Art Artist Garden British Visuals Visual Artist

Author:Jerry Saltz

“I see around 100 shows a month, going from Niketown-size palaces where you feel like yelling, to storefronts in Bushwick. Each has to pay the bills; keep artists happy; and cope with collectors (oy!), curators (ay-yi-yi), critics (woo-hoo!), and occasionally plumbers. That their fiscal life often hangs in the balance only adds to the energy.”

Feels Shows Artist Energy Pay Months Balance Bills Add Critics Size Palaces Collectors Yelling Plumber Curator

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Imagine it's 1981. You're an artist, in love with art, smitten with art history. You're also a woman, with almost no mentors to look to; art history just isn't that into you. Any woman approaching art history in the early eighties was attempting to enter an almost foreign country, a restricted and exclusionary domain that spoke a private language.”

Looks Art Country Artist Language Imagine Spokes Mentor Domain Attempting Eighty Art History Foreign Countries Smitten

Author:Jerry Saltz

“In the seventies, a group of American artists seized the means not of production but of reproduction. They tore apart visual culture at a time of no money, no market, and no one paying attention except other artists. Vietnam and Watergate had happened; everything in America was being questioned.”

Mean America Artist Culture Attention Happened Groups Productions Pay Attention Visuals Vietnam Seventies No Money Reproduction Watergate

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Lucian Freud's career affirms that the only thing an artist can do is remain true to whatever vision, (lack of) talent, or ideas that happened to pick them in order to be made known to the world.”

World Made Ideas Artist Order Can Do Known Vision Careers Happened Talent Picks

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Marlene Dumas is one of the two or three most successful female artists alive, if you judge by prices. I've never reviewed her work, because I find nothing in it to get excited about no matter how hard I look.”

Ifs Looks Two Matter Hard Artist Three Successful Alive Judging Female Excited Female Artists

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Much good art got made while money ruled; I like a lot of it, and hardship and poverty aren't virtues. The good news is that, since almost no one will be selling art, artists - especially emerging ones - won't have to think about turning out a consistent style or creating a brand. They'll be able to experiment as much as they want.”

Thinking Want Art Made Able Artist Poverty Virtue Style Creating News Experiments Selling Brands Consistent Hardship Good News Emerging Good Art

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Not to say people shouldn't get rich from art. I adore the alchemy wherein artists who cast a complex spell make rich people give them their money. (Just writing it makes me cackle.) But too many artists have been making money without magic.”

People Giving Writing Has Beens Art Artist Rich Magic Complexes Casts Making Money Spells Adore Rich People Get Rich Alchemy

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Pictures artists staged their own images or copied or cut out others already in existence. The viewer took them in separately, in sometimes paradoxical waves: an original image, then the manipulations of it, then the places where image and idea intersected. This created a crucial perceptual glitch that irony and understanding filled.”

Ideas Sometimes Artist Understanding Existence Cutting Originals Filled Wave Irony Manipulation Crucial Viewers Paradoxical Glitches

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Put yourself in the position of an up-and-coming artist living in early-sixteenth-century Italy. Now imagine trying to distinguish yourself from the other artists living in your town: Michelangelo, Raphael, Leonardo, or Titian. Is it any wonder that the Italian High Renaissance lasted only 30 years?”

Trying Years Artist Wonder Imagine Century Position Towns Italian Renaissance Leonardo Raphael

Author:Jerry Saltz

“The very paradigm of revolution, of right versus wrong, good versus bad, is a relic with no bearing on the present. Yet artists, exhibitions, and curators valorize the sixties. People who wrote about these artists 30 years ago still write about them in the same ways, often for the same magazines.”

People Way Writing Years Stills Artist Revolution Years Ago Magazines Sixty Versus Paradigm Exhibitions Relics Curator

Author:Jerry Saltz

“There's something pleasing about large, well-lit spaces. I love that dealers are willing to take massive chances in order to give this much room to their artists. Most of all, I love that more galleries showing more art gives more artists a shot.”

Giving Wells Art Artist Order Chance Space Rooms Willing Shots Massive Lit Gallery Dealer

Author:Jerry Saltz

“Too many younger artists, critics, and curators are fetishizing the sixties, transforming the period into a deformed cult, a fantasy religion, a hip brand, and a crippling disease.”

Artist Fantasy Periods Disease Critics Brands Hips Sixty Cult Transforming Curator

Author:Jerry Saltz

“'Untitled' is a time machine that can transport you to 1992, an edgy moment when the art world was crumbling, money was scarce, and artists like Tiravanija were in the nascent stages of combining Happenings, performance art, John Cage, Joseph Beuys, and the do-it-yourself ethos of punk. Meanwhile, a new art world was coming into being.”

World Art Moments Artist Stage Happenings Machines Performances Punk Cages Scarce Transport Art World Combining Edgy Do It Yourself Ethos Crumbling Time Machine Performance Art

Author:Jerry Saltz

“When I criticize Joseph Beuys or Francis Bacon, nobody calls those opinions anti-male. Putting female artists or their subject matter off-limits is itself sexist and limiting.”

Matter Artist Opinion Subjects Limits Female Males Criticize Subject Matter Sexist Female Artists

Author:Jerry Saltz

“All great contemporary artists, schooled or not, are essentially self-taught and are de-skilling like crazy. I don't look for skill in art... skill has nothing to do with technical proficiency... I'm interested in people who rethink skill, who redefine or reimagine it: an engineer, say, who builds rockets from rocks.”

People Looks Art Self Artist Crazy Rocks Taught Skills Contemporary Engineers Rockets Schooled Self Taught Proficiency

Author:Jerry Saltz

About the Author

Born: March 19, 1951
Known for: Art critic
Quotes: 212

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