David Salle at BHQFU - Leave The Theory at Home

David Salle is teaching an art criticism class at The Bruce High Quality Foundation University that I'm lucky enough to be in. 

The first assignment was an abstract associative approach to describing art as a response to three different prompts. 

I'm sharing the responses I wrote below. I recommend trying it out! It's super fun once you get going.

This is art that says...

Abe Morell's photos say abracadabra.

Claes Oldenburg's sculptures say look in between your couch cushions.

Holly Coulis paintings say I'm reading your dreams.

Guido Reni paintings say it's time to waltz.

Trenton Doyle Hancock's work says meat is good for you.

Marilyn Minter's work says more is more, darling.

Morandi's work says I only drink water, no ice.

Kusama's paintings say the infinite is finite.

Erwin Wurm's work says the world is a dumb place if you look at it hard enough.

Diane Arbus photos say quit staring.

10 examples of art and place them in their appropriate settings.

Lisa Yuskavage paintings belong in the waiting room of the gynecologist office to lend some humor, color and poignancy to the absurdity of being a woman.

While exploring a mountain trail in Vermont, slightly dehydrated and blurry from the trek I would like to stumble upon a Neo Rauch painting tucked away in a cave slightly hidden by the brush.

Peter Doig paintings belong in a child's playroom.

I would like to see Richard Serra sculptures replace all the jungle gyms in the playgrounds in Central Park. Children would desperately throwing themselves at the hard vertical sides of the forms trying to pull themselves up onto the sculpture with their skinny booger covered fingers.

Daniel Richter paintings would be at home in a dance tent at a music festival.

Rachel Whiteread sculptures belong in the lego section of FAO Schwartz.

Dante Gabriel Rosetti paintings would find a happy home in the library of The Brearley School, an upper east side girls school full of teenaged literary feminists.

Yayoi Kusama's room installations are what you should walk through after exiting an ice skating rink when your body is warm with blood bumping from activity and your skin is cold from the raw winter air.

Stephen Mueller paintings belong in the waiting room at the eye doctor.

Mamma Andersson paintings would be at home at every slumber party I've ever had.

This work puts me in mind of…….”

Vuillard paintings put me in the mind of the way space feel when you hide under a table.

Josephine Halvorson paintings put me in the mind of watching an ant carry a leaf that is four times the size of his own body.

The main James Turrel work at the Guggenheim make me think of the title screen of Looney Tunes.

Mike Kelley sculptures put me in the mind of being in the ball pit at McDonald's.

Louise Bourgeois puts me in the mind of that feeling you get right after waking from a bad dream where the horror still feels near but you can just taste the relief of distance.

Dan Flavin puts me in the mind of being on a beach when the sun is directly overhead and I lie down and close my eyes but the sun burns through my lids creating that inescapable red glow.

Michael Borremons paintings put me in the mind of being in a foreign country where a beer is still a beer but all the signs are in another language.

Martha Colburn videos put me in the mind of being a child and looking through flip books.

Balthus paintings put me in the mind of waking up in a bedroom that isn't yours and forgetting, just for the brief moment when you are opening your eyes, where you are.

Sally Mann's photographs put me in the mind of being a child and realizing that one day your parents are going to die.