Weirdness Sells

By Patrick Appel
Holland Cotter on the limits of weirdness in art:

...weird is too easy, too obvious, too thin. Like Surrealism, which is weirdness psychologized and academicized, it delivers a quick thrill but ends up being a snore...artists, caught up in a New York market that prospers from a million little weirdnesses, should take a head-clearing plunge back into work and see if there aren’t some other ways to go. Weird can be cool; it can be powerful. (The paintings of John Currin and Peter Saul are good examples.) But as an end-in-itself exercise...it’s a waste of time.