No great artist ever sees things as they really are. If he did, he would cease to be an artist.

No great artist ever sees things as they really are. If he did, he would cease to be an artist.

Giving jazz the Congressional seal of approval is a little like making Huck Finn an honorary Boy Scout.

Giving jazz the Congressional seal of approval is a little like making Huck Finn an honorary Boy Scout.

Art is permitted to survive only if it renounces the right to be different, and integrates itself into the omnipotent read more

Art is permitted to survive only if it renounces the right to be different, and integrates itself into the omnipotent realm of the profane.

I remember being handed a score composed by Mozart at the age of eleven. What could I say? I felt read more

I remember being handed a score composed by Mozart at the age of eleven. What could I say? I felt like de Kooning, who was asked to comment on a certain abstract painting, and answered in the negative. He was then told it was the work of a celebrated monkey. 'That's different. For a monkey, it's terrific.' - "London Magazine", March, 1967.

As for types like my own, obscurely motivated by the conviction that our existence was worthless if we didn't make read more

As for types like my own, obscurely motivated by the conviction that our existence was worthless if we didn't make a turning point of it, we were assigned to the humanities, to poetry, philosophy, painting -- the nursery games of humankind, which had to be left behind when the age of science began. The humanities would be called upon to choose a wallpaper for the crypt, as the end drew near.

Immature artists imitate. Mature artists steal.

Immature artists imitate. Mature artists steal.

What garlic is to salad, insanity is to art.

What garlic is to salad, insanity is to art.

The artist's world is limitless. It can be found anywhere, far from where he lives or a few feet away. read more

The artist's world is limitless. It can be found anywhere, far from where he lives or a few feet away. It is always on his doorstep.

Feminist art is not some tiny creek running off the great river of real art. It is not some crack read more

Feminist art is not some tiny creek running off the great river of real art. It is not some crack in an otherwise flawless stone. It is, quite spectacularly I think, art which is not based on the subjugation of one half of the species. It is art which will take the great human themes --love, death, heroism, suffering, history itself --and render them fully human. It may also, though perhaps our imaginations are so mutilated now that we are incapable even of the ambition, introduce a new theme, one as great and as rich as those others --should we call it "joy"?.