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You like it, that's all, whether it's a landscape or abstract. You like it. It hits you. You don't have to read it. The work of art-sculpture or painting-forces your eye.
Clement Greenberg
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Interpretation

What this quote means

Art appreciation is instinctual; it's about personal reaction rather than analysis.

In this quote, Clement Greenberg emphasizes the inherent emotional connection individuals have with art, whether it be traditional landscapes or abstract pieces. He suggests that the impact of art does not require intellectual dissection; rather, it compels viewers to engage visually, creating a profound appreciation based solely on personal preference and feeling.

Themes

ArtAppreciationEmotionVisualExperience

In practice

Example use cases

In an art critique session, one could use this quote to emphasize the subjective nature of art interpretation.

More from Clement Greenberg

The dissolution of the pictorial into sheer texture, into apparently sheer sensation, into an accumulation of repetitions, seems to speak for and answer something profound in contemporary sensibility.
Clement GreenbergRead

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