Leo Steinberg Quotes

If a work of art or a new style disturbs you, then it is probably good work. If you hate it, it is probably great.

The critic interested in a novel manifestation holds his criteria and taste in reserve. Since they were formed upon yesterday's art, he does not assume that they are ready-made for today.

...it is in the nature of original contemporary art to present itself as a bad risk. And we the public...should be proud of being in this predicament, because nothing else would seem to us quite true to life; and art, after all, is supposed to be a mirror of life.

One way to cope with the provocations of novel art is to rest firm and maintain solid standards... set by the critic's long-practiced taste and by his conviction that only those innovations will be significant which promote the established direction of advanced art.

Whatever else art is good for, its chief effectiveness lies in propagating more art.

All art is infested by other art.

One of the things I find most mysterious in Picasso's work is what I would call the 'unlocation of place.