Of course art world ethics are important. But museums are no purer than any other institution or business. Academics aren't necessarily more high-minded than gallerists.

In art, scandal is a false narrative, a smoke screen that camouflages rather than reveals. When we don't know what we're seeing, we overreact.

I have a soft spot for art that, in terms of subject matter and material, is in bad taste.

In the late nineties, Katy Grannan began making haunting photographs of people who had extraordinary inner yens to be seen by strangers.

I know it's dangerous to take on bloggers. They can go after you every day, all day long, and anonymous people can chime in, too.

The reason the art world doesn't respond to Kinkade is because none - not one - of his ideas about subject-matter, surface, color, composition, touch, scale, form, or skill is remotely original. They're all cliche and already told.

Batty as it sounds, subject and style may choose artists, through some unfathomable cosmic means. How else to explain that even artists who enjoy what they do can be perplexed or even horrified that they're doing it?