“Art is not about understanding,” New York magazine senior art critic Jerry Saltz told a packed crowd of adoring listeners at the Expo Chicago fair on Thursday morning. He was delivering his keynote speech for the fair’s “Dialogues” program. “Art is about experience. Nobody listens to a song and says, ‘I don’t understand that.’”
The native Chicagoan and “people’s critic” held no punches in his meandering talk, offering his uncensored opinion on Art Basel Miami Beach (“the dumb Basel”) and Jeff Koons (“He wakes up in the morning and thinks he’s Ronald Reagan“). Perhaps the most valuable part of the frenzied speech, however, came at the end, when Saltz doled out a few choice pieces of advice for artists. We’ve paraphrased them for your reading pleasure below.
1. Go to an art school that doesn’t cost too much. Those who go to Yale and Columbia might get a nine-month career bump right after graduation, but you’ll all be back on the same level in a year, and you won’t be in as much debt.
2. Envy will eat you alive.
3. Stay up late with each other after all the professors go to sleep. Support one another.
4. You can’t think your way through an art problem. As John Cage said, “Work comes from work.”
5. Follow your obsessions. If you love the Cubs that much, maybe they need to be in your work.
6. Don’t take other people’s ideas of skill. Do brain surgery with an axe.
7. Don’t define success by money, but by time.
8. Do not let rejection define you.
9. Don’t worry about getting enough sleep. Worry about your work.
10. Be delusional. It’s okay to tell yourself you’re a genius sometimes.
— Julia Halperin
Tags: Art Basel Miami Beach, Expo Chicago, Jeff Koons, Jerry Saltz, Julia Halperin, Speeches, Talks
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Thank you great Jerry for your generous 10 points. Keeping them in the studio as a reminder. This is not the first time that I follow your savvy advice, Dr. Dr. Dr. Saltz.
11.Leggere, vedere, ascoltare, e mai dimenticare che vivi sul pianeta Terra.
You have to understand language before you can fully experience it. Sorry Dr. Saltz I won’t be taking your post modern prescription as understanding and experience go hand in hand.
And I always thought Jeff Koons was Pee Wee Herman
Advice from the point of view of a critic, not an artist.
I think he’s dead on.
Keith: Correct. He is a critic.
Nicolai Fechin: “Artists and critics compete with each other in their endeavors to destroy the traditional approach to the fundamental principles required for the careful technical execution of any work. In their mad pursuit of novelty, they do not have enough time for a conscientious development of their ideas and, as a result, they have had to make legitimate that which I would call “illiteracy” in the arts. Such an attitude in the art of our day is harmful not so much in itself, but in that it is used by intellectuals, by means of the written word, to influence the unprepared mind of the student. Youth is infected with a careless and irresponsible attitude toward the execution of work, with a sense of easy attainment, seeking to attract attention by shallow-minded novelties instead of real innovations and discrimination.”
Last I saw, Jerry was in awe of a stack of styrofoam trays on tv and some glad bags pinned to a wall in a pricy uptown gallery. If he knew what worked, he’d be an artist, or a dealer, or a rich collector, and not a critic, right?
@Dave: If we listen to Nicolai Fechin’s advice there would be no passion within expression. I would compare this advice and thinking to taking out a guidebook to make love. There is no sense of Truth. This may be good for the novice artist who still needs to learn but real art is made from the heart and the mind does not need to tell the hand to think anymore. It creates what the self feels.
jerry’s good for art. he just lacks irony and a certain breadth of either experience, or memory. talks a pretty good game. just doesn’t always live up to it. but mostly it seems he does. and none of us live up to our own hype or ideals. i don’t begrudge his p.o.v. although he did mine. but that’s because he thought he needed to defend hirst from me, a nobody. or maybe he was defending civility, which is a stupid thing to do in art, and he knows it. i instead, was defending punk, and irony, and the kind of love delivered in a half full beer thrown full force at the drummer of the band that one is digging to no end. only, the beer was the f-word and the drummer was damien hirst. so jerry is good for art. he’s just not the end-all-be-all. we all draw our lines where we choose, even when it renders us a hypocrite in the eyes of others. one takes what speaks to you from wherever it comes and moves forward.
Advice? How much was he paid for that elementary simple drivel? Come on, if you don’t know that already yet just as stupid as the speaker. The emperor wears no clothes.
Thank-you Jerry.
From a critics point of view, a mentor’s point of view, or an artist’s point of view, I don’t think it really matters. We should know what is good advice when we hear it, and this is no exception. But like any good points we read or hear, it would be wise to always take it with a grain of salt. Any artist ought to be his own worst critic, anyway.
Jerry is brilliant. he has been doing it for a very long time. his advice was right on.
Add one more thing. Dont read the art magazines too much. Great art can be found in other great art.
jerry is a critic, and for all his jeff koons bashing (its cool and in cuz he, and most people on this post are “educated artists” right?) you could call him the jeff koons of criticism. any artist who needs any rules to live by as a compass measure for being an artist is as lost as dear jerry.
If Jerry saltz knew what the art experience was he would not be handing out advice, but searching for a primal state of mind.
Oh my God.. Jerry speaks some dangerous advices… given in a talk… in a specific moment and its gratefully being shared in “paraphrased them for your reading pleasure below.” Will i survive to this…or my world will fall apart…give me a break…
Thanks Jerry- I like those values you espouse. We all need to remember them.
Jerry, Hue are the Greatest.
Critics criticize. They put into sound packages, the thoughts of thier ears or eyes. Some are paid, some are not. Those that like to listen to the thoughts of packaged ear and eye evaluations of works, respond with a smile or a frown. In fact the artist continues and responds to thier own drummer after hearing the verbage of a viewer, not a doer.
Absolutely dead on
One of my favourite advice I ever got, was from a writer late night in the London underground club, 1990! Standing there in the smoky den, the wise man told me: You don’t need advice, you need a vice! In fact, I always thought he was right on the mark !
Thanks for these great advices Jerry. We all should keep in mind.
Art may not be about understanding, but neither should it be without any point, purpose or beauty. Should it?
His advice is great for certain extremely right-brained artists. Some left-brain artists and some illustrators would be offended. Some think Duchamp was brilliant, but others saw him as a crazy con-artist.
I will add some cues, not given in art schools.
Make the work and build an art bank.
Learn how to get press/foto feature, by calling.
Call voice to voice-not email.
Show your art in a buyer’s home.
Put your snail mail address on stuff.
Copy feature stories at the instant printers.
Write real letters on the copies mail them to people.
Have business cards on you all the time.
Make all purpose postcards, put several images on them.
Get several sponsors to support you for 2-3-4-6 months,
pay back with art.
Send the reporter a hand written thank you.
Stay in touch with good writers/story tellers.
DO THIS AND YOU WILL GET NEW PEOPLE TO KNOW YOU AND YOUR WORK.
REPEAT OFTEN.
Sincerely,
Bob Ragland- Non-starving artist -Denver,Colorado
Thanks Bob Ragland for solid advice . I really appreciate it . At times when I get out of the studio I wonder how an artist should reach out, and frankly I like what you said because I get lost in the e world . Thanks again.
This is just the boost I needed today. Thank you so much!