Quote

I'm surprised when the work appears beautiful, and very pleased. And I think work can be very good and very successful without being able to call it beautiful, although I'm not clear about that. The work is good when it has a certain completeness and when it's got a certain completeness, then it's beautiful.

Bruce Nauman

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Bruce Nauman
Age: 83
Born: 1941
Born: January 1
Artist
Drawer
Installation Artist
Performance Artist
Photographer
Printmaker
Sculptor
Television Producer
Video Artist
Fort Wayne
Indiana
Think
Call
Thinking
Clear
Beautiful
Completeness
Certain
Pleased
Able
Surprised
Without
Appears
Work
Although
Good
Successful

More quotes by Bruce Nauman

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Did you stop because it was good enough, or could have done more - but then maybe ruined it too? Sometimes you finish because you've gone too far.
Bruce Nauman
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I like to combine different aspects in my work, to cover different areas, but I do see them as being separate.
Bruce Nauman
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What is it that an artist does when he is left alone in his studio? My conclusion was that if I was an artist and I was in the studio, then everything I was doing in the studio should be art . . . . From that point on, art became more of an activity and less of a product.
Bruce Nauman
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I don't like to think about being an influence. It's embarrassing.
Bruce Nauman
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I want to be in the studio. I want to be doing something. You just do whatever is at hand, and you don't even worry about whether it's going to be interesting or not interesting to anybody else-or even yourself. You just have to make something.
Bruce Nauman
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Pete and Repeat were sitting on a wall. Pete fell off. Who was left? Repeat.
Bruce Nauman
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I'll talk. You'll listen.
Bruce Nauman
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I like to use my hands and make things... It might seem pretty stupid or pointless but that doesn't matter... some of the most interesting work is the stuff that starts like that - out of a raw need for activity.
Bruce Nauman
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And I don't have any specific steps to take because I don't start the same way every time. But there is a knowing when it's enough and you can leave it alone.
Bruce Nauman
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The true artist helps the world by revealing mystic truths.
Bruce Nauman
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In the studio, I don't do a lot of work that requires repetitive activity. I spend a lot of time looking and thinking and then try to find the most efficient way to get what I want, whether it's making a drawing or a sculpture, or casting plaster or whatever.
Bruce Nauman
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And the part about being a professional artist is that you can tell, and you can do it over again, even if you can't say how you got there exactly.
Bruce Nauman
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Generalised anger and frustration is something that gets you in the studio, and gets you to work - though it's not necessarily evident in anything that's finished.
Bruce Nauman
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And then what makes the work interesting is if you choose the right questions.
Bruce Nauman
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In art, the only one who really knows whether what you've done is honest is the artist.
Bruce Nauman