Give My Regards to Eighth Street Quotes

“Art in relation to life is nothing more than a glove turned inside out. It seems to have the same shapes and contours, but it can never be used for the same purpose. Art teaches nothing about life, just as life teaches us nothing about art.”
― Morton Feldman, Give My Regards to Eighth Street: Collected Writings

“At a party Larry Rivers complained of the heat. Feldman said, “You're a painter — break a window.”
― Morton Feldman, Give My Regards to Eighth Street: Collected Writings

“Music’s tragedy is that it begins with perfection.”
― Morton Feldman, Give My Regards to Eighth Street: Collected Writings

“Kierkegaard says that all speculative philosophy cannot equal in complexity the dialectic of a woman who has been deceived. He goes on to explain that such a woman cannot find an object for her pain, because love cannot grasp the thought that it has been deceived. In art, it is the system itself that holds out the false promise, that deceives. We might almost say that art is in pain, because it is unable to believe this deception is taking place. The artist feels his work goes badly because he is not reaching technical perfection. Actually, he is looking into the eyes of a deceiver, who constantly throws him back into the dilemma — the paradox. Is it lying to me or not, he asks himself. He ends by believing the lie, in the face of all evidence against it, because he needs this lie to exist in his art.”
― Morton Feldman, Give My Regards to Eighth Street: Collected Writings