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In the United States, revolts tends to be directed against specific situations, rarely against the social structure as a whole.

Harold Rosenberg

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Harold Rosenberg
Age: 72 †
Born: 1906
Born: February 2
Died: 1978
Died: July 11
Art Critic
Art Historian
Journalist
Philosopher
Teacher
Writer
New York City
New York
Revolt
United
Social
Directed
States
Tends
Whole
Situations
Rarely
Specific
Structure
Revolts
Situation

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The big moment came when it was decided to paint...Just To Paint. The gesture on the canvas was a gesture of liberation, from Value- political, aesthetic, moral.
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At a certain moment the canvas began to appear to one American painter after another as an arena in which to act-rather than as a space in which to reproduce, re-design, analyze or express an object, actual or imagined. What was to go on the canvas was not a picture but an event.
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No degree of dullness can safeguard a work against the determination of critics to find it fascinating.
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Only through apprehending, by means of present-day creations, how art is created, can the creations of other periods be genuinely appreciated.
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The aim of every authentic artist is not to conform to the history of art, but to release himself from it in order to replace it with his own history.
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Abstract art as it is conceived at present is a game bequeathed to painting and sculpture by art history. One who accepts its premises must consent to limit his imagination to a depressing casuistry regarding the formal requirements of modernism.
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Both art and the artist lack identity and define themselves only through their encounter with each other.
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How much the work of an artist owes to an art movement to which he belongs can never be determined exactly, if only because the movement derives its character from the individual creations of its members.
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Not only were the minds of artists formed by the university in the same mold were formed those of the art historians, the critics, the curators, and the collectors by whom their work was evaluated. With the rise of Conceptual art, the classroom announced its final triumph over the studio.
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Avant-gardism is an addiction that can be appeased only by a revolution in permanence.
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Art has arrived at the paradox that tradition itself requires the occurrence of radical attacks on tradition.
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The story of Americans is the story of arrested metamorphoses. Those who achieve success come to a halt and accept themselves as they are. Those who fail become resigned and accept themselves as they are.
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Only conservatives believe that subversion is still being carried on in the arts and that society is being shaken by it.
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In reality, however, an artist is a product of art
Harold Rosenberg
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Only conservatives believe that subversion is still being carried on in the arts and that society is being shaken by it. Advanced art today is no longer a cause -it contains no moral imperative. There is no virtue in clinging to principles and standards, no vice in selling or in selling out.
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What better way to prove that you understand a subject than to make money out of it?
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No dealer, curator, buyer or critic, or any existing combination of these, can be depended on to produce a reputation that is more than a momentary flurry.
Harold Rosenberg
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For the artist, fulfillment of self consists not in marching in the ranks of the liberators but in being entered in the roll of the Masters. The artist tends to find himself in the position of a deserter from his social group or, at best, one who collaborates, with secret reservations.
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The struggle to make an absolute statement in an individually conceived vocabulary accounts for the profound tensions inherent in the best modern work.
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American time has stretched around the world. It has become the dominant tempo of modern history, especially of the history of Europe.
Harold Rosenberg