Richard Serra Quotes

Quotes about:

• I consider space to be a material. The articulation of space has come to take precedence over other concerns. I attempt to use sculptural form to make space distinct.

  Richard Serra

  Space, Sculpture, Use

  Kynaston McShine, Richard Serra, Lynne Cooke, Museum of Modern Art (New York, N.Y.) (2007). “Richard Serra Sculpture: Forty Years”, p.77, The Museum of Modern Art

  110 Copy quote

• What interests me is the opportunity for all of us to become something different from what we are, by constructing spaces that contribute something to the experience of who we are.

  Richard Serra

  Opportunity, Space, Different

  82 Copy quote

• To see is to think, and to think is to see.

  Richard Serra

  Thinking

  YouTube Channel "KunstSpektrum"/"Richard Serra - Talk with Charlie Rose (2001)", www.youtube.com. May 20, 2011.

  38 Copy quote

• Everything we choose in life for its lightness soon reveals its unbearable weight.

  Richard Serra

  Weight, Unbearable, Lightness

  Richard Serra (1994). “Writings/Interviews”, p.185, University of Chicago Press

  62 Copy quote

• Play is a necessary ingredient in art because there is a kind of wonder that goes on when you play. You're directing your activity toward a conclusion that isn't prescribed by a particular method.

  Richard Serra

  Art, Play, Ingredients

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• Your eye is a muscle, you have to keep it in shape and the more you draw, the more you see.

  Richard Serra

  Eye, Shapes, Muscles

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• The viewer becomes aware of himself and of his movement through the plaza. As he moves, the sculpture changes. Contraction and expansion of the sculpture result from the viewer's movement. Step by step the perception not only of the sculpture but of the entire environment changes.

  Richard Serra

  Moving, Perception, Expansion

  Richard Serra, William Diamond (1985). “In the matter of a public hearing on the "Tilted arc" outdoor sculpture located in front plaza of Jacob Javits Federal Office Building: held at the Ceremonial Room, International Trade Court, One Federal Plaza, New York, New York ... : before: William Diamond, ... [et al.].”

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• Art for the most part, is about concentration, solitude and determination. It's really not about other people's needs and assumptions. I'm not interested in the notion that art serves something. Art is useless, not useful.

  Richard Serra

  Determination, Art, People

  53 Copy quote

• Time and movement became really crucial to how I deal with what I deal with - not only sight and boundary, but how one walks through a piece, and what one feels and registers in terms of one's own body in relation to another body.

  Richard Serra

  Sight, Pieces, Movement

  "“Charlie Brown”". Art21 Intreview, art21.org.

  43 Copy quote

• Work out of your work. Don't work out of anybody else's work.

  Richard Serra

  Work Out

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• Art is not democratic. It is not for the people.

  Richard Serra

  Art, People, Democratic

  "Man of steel" by Sean O'Hagan, www.theguardian.com. October 4, 2008.

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• I was in analysis and I told my analyst I wanted to be the best sculptor in the world and he said, 'Richard, calm down.'

  Richard Serra

  Analysis, World, Calm

  Interview with Charlie Rose, November 14, 2001.

  31 Copy quote

• Basically, what you really want to do is try to engage the viewer's body relation to his thinking and walking and looking, without being overly heavy-handed about it.

  Richard Serra

  Thinking, Walking Away, Trying

  35 Copy quote

• Most of what you see in architecture are watered-down ideas of sculptors who have come before.

  Richard Serra

  Ideas, Architecture, Sculptors

  Charlie Rose interview, November 14, 2001.

  29 Copy quote

• If you reduce sculpture to the flat plane of the photograph, you're passing on only a residue of your concerns... You're not only reducing the sculpture to a different scale for the purposes of consumption, but you're denying the real content of the work.

  Richard Serra

  Real, Passing On, Different

  Richard Serra, Clara Weyergraf-Serra (1980). “Richard Serra, Interviews, Etc., 1970-1980”, p.170, Hudson River Museum

  36 Copy quote

• I think you always have to find where the boundary is in relation to the context in order to be able to kind of articulate how you want the space to interact with the viewer.

  Richard Serra

  Thinking, Order, Space

  32 Copy quote

• It could be that people want to consume sculpture the way they consume paintings - through photographs... I'm interested in the experience of sculpture in the place where it resides.

  Richard Serra

  People, Sculpture, Want

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• But what does interest me is the notion that if you do a lot of work it means there's a potential for other people to understand that a lot of things are possible with a sustained effort and that the broadening of experiences is possible and I think that's all art can be.

  Richard Serra

  Art, Mean, Thinking

  28 Copy quote

• But I don't think of any particular viewer in mind other than myself.

  Richard Serra

  Thinking, Mind, Particular

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• When I moved into making sculpture, I could handle steel the way it had been handled in the technological revolution. I could use it the way bridge builders used it; I could use it the way they used it in industry and building and not the way it had been used in art.

  Richard Serra

  Art, Bridges, Way

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• I started working for Bethlehem Steel when I was about 16 during the summers.

  Richard Serra

  Summer, Steel, Bethlehem

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• But I'll try to immerse myself in as many of the formal characteristics of site as possible in the landscape.

  Richard Serra

  Trying, Landscape, Characteristics

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• If your educe sculpture to the flat plane of the temporal experience of the work. (...) the experience of the work is inseparable from the place in which the work resides. Apart from that condition, any experience of the work is a deception.

  Richard Serra

  Deception, Sculpture, Planes

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• I think this, I think basically I'm not interested in people following my work or making work like my work.

  Richard Serra

  Thinking, People, Not Interested

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• I think different people have different problems and different relations to the exhibition of their work.

  Richard Serra

  Thinking, People, Different

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