Adrian Searle (born 1953 in Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire) is an art critic for The Guardian, and has been writing for the paper since 1996. Previously he was a painter.
Originally a painter, represented by Nigel Greenwood Gallery, London, and exhibiting widely, he stopped when he took up his newspaper job. He said, "I was always torn between making art and writing. Writing won." He also occasionally writes fiction.[3]
Ofili says that he was trying to do something sincere – whatever sincerity means nowadays. It would be a great pity to split The Upper Room apart, to sell the paintings one by one. The Tate should buy it. The Upper Room is better than Ofili probably realises.[5]
Charles Saatchi had almost completed installing New Blood at his gallery at London's County Hall last week when we met by chance. "Let me write your review for you," he said, enraged. "I'm a cunt, this place is shit, and the artists I show are all fucked. Will that do for you?" I almost wish my views could be expressed with the same vigour, precision and exactitude. It would save a lot of time.[6]
Once in a lifetime is too often for the Stuckists. So dreadful are they that one might be forgiven for thinking there must be something to them. There isn't, except a lot of ranting.[7]
The eye-candy dot paintings walked off the walls; the gore sells in buckets. But the spin paintings were always miserable and the big bronzes are boring. Nor has his art been particularly influential, or developed much. Hirst has lived his career backwards, doing his greatest work first, saving all the repetitive stuff and the juvenilia for later.[8]
We learn that she's "so tired and borred of masterbating". Why not just give it a break, Tray? ... This exhibition is an exhausting bender, careening from highs to lows. The lows are bad. Somehow Emin wouldn't be any good if they weren't.[9]
