Anton Chekhov Quotes

Criticism talks a good deal of nonsense, but even its nonsense is a useful force. It keeps the question of art before the world, insists upon its importance.

If art is to have a special train, the critic must keep some seats reserved on it.

I get the feeling that people from outside the world of contemporary art see it as deserving of mockery, in an emperor's-new-clothes sort of way. I think that's not right and that it's just because they don't understand the discourse.

I don't pretend to know anything about art. I make pictures for entertainment, and then the professors tell me what they mean.

A good critic is the man who describes his adventures among masterpieces.

Critics of art are like eunuchs in harem. They see how it's done when the men come to see the women, but they can't do it themselves.

I don't very much enjoy looking at paintings in general. I know too much about them. I take them apart.

Frankly, these days, without a theory to go with it, I can't see a painting.

Everybody's an art critic.

In spite the mountains of books written about art, no precise definition of art has been constructed. And the reason for this is that the conception of art has been based on the conception of beauty.

Chatter about art is almost always useless.

Art critic! Is that a profession? When I think we are stupid enough, we painters, to solicit those people's compliments and to put ourselves into their hands! What shame! Should we even accept that they talk about our work?

It is obvious that art cannot teach anyone anything, since in four thousand years humanity has learnt nothing at all.

I was truly ignorant about art before the film.

I spend much more time looking at art history and at different references to art than I do at actual objects.

I like art history and art criticism. Leo Steinberg has always been my favorite. He's very original, very accurate and acute.

Art needs to be socialised, and you need a lot of context to understand that, and that doesn't mean having read a few art history books.

People go into a gallery, and they're afraid to express their opinions about art. No one's afraid to say, 'Keanu Reeves was bad in that movie.' We see so many films that we can tell who's faking it. But with art, we can't always tell.

Because I'm an art historian, I have some experience of writing that comes out of close attention. That's what really art history is. You're looking at something very closely, and you try to write in a meticulous way about it.

Overhearing people's conversations about art - that's always entertaining.

Often, when art from the canon is brought in to fine art classes, it is used as a prop to inspire art-making projects but more rarely as something to study in-depth for itself.

I wanted to go into art history. Acting fell into my lap when a neighbor took pictures of me and showed them to an agent.

I find relatively little relationship between the work of art and the immediate critical response it gets.

I've always been very opinionated, for lack of a better term, about art. Not to sound too arrogant, but I guess I'm a connoisseur of telling people what I think is good and bad.

The Art Snob will stand back from a picture at some distance, his head cocked slightly to one side