Calling A Young Artist 'great' These Days

After Its Hothouse Incubation In The Seventies, Appropriation Breathed Important New Life Into Art. This Life Flowered Spectacularly Over The Decades - Even If It's Now Close To Aesthetic Kudzu.

It Took The Metropolitan Museum Of Art Nearly 50 Years To Wake Up To Pablo Picasso. It Didn't Own One Of His Paintings Until 1946, When Gertrude Stein Bequeathed That Indomitable Quasi-cubistic Picture Of Herself - A Portrait Of The Writer As A Sumo Buddha - To The Met, Principally Because She Disliked The Museum Of Modern Art.

Yes, 85 Percent Of The Art You See Isn't Any Good. But Everyone Has A Different Opinion About Which 85 Percent Is Bad. That In Turn Creates Fantastically Unstable Interplay And Argument.

Put Yourself In The Position Of An Up-and-coming Artist Living In Early-sixteenth-century Italy. Now Imagine Trying To Distinguish Yourself From The Other Artists Living In Your Town: Michelangelo, Raphael, Leonardo, Or Titian. Is It Any Wonder That The Italian High Renaissance Lasted Only 30 Years?

Appropriation Is The Idea That Ate The Art World. Go To Any Chelsea Gallery Or International Biennial And You'll Find It. It's There In Paintings Of Photographs, Photographs Of Advertising, Sculpture With Ready-made Objects, Videos Using Already-existing Film.