There are times when being scandalous or provocative can help bring focus to issues of major concern.
— Maurizio Cattelan
If you are a plumber, there is an objective way to establish whether you put together a great piping system or not. Art is a bit more slippery than that.
When you place art in the shops, it's a way to make it more accessible.
I find Instagram interesting to the extent that new royal families are born and die there, such as The Kardashians of L.A.
Rules are simply obstacles to be jumped, like in a horse race: higher and higher every time.
Every morning, we choose between milk or tea or coffee. Usually, I know what I like, but I don't rule out changing my idea sometimes. The editing process is one of the most important parts in everyday life. The same is with my work: mistakes are part of the decision-making process.
You don't wanna see your work, because you might find out that you do not like it.
I have become an employee of art.
Sooner or later, all magazines end up in the toilet.
I produce so little that the works have to be editioned. Otherwise, I don't survive. Also, editioning is relevant for communication. If you make three new works, it means that nine objects are available. Three people talking about your work is fine, but nine makes a difference.
I never tried to make money - just enough to be able to eat.
Art fairs are a lot like professional proms - you make contacts, have a lot to look at, and in some cases, you make friends forever. I think that for artists, they can be a bit controversial: they stimulate curiosity, but at the same time, you're always trying to not have your work hung on a wall.
Stuffed animals are sad and scary; they have humorous and tragic qualities.
I think that laughter and death are closely related: comedy is the quintessential human reaction to the fear of death. It's probably linked with the fact that we are the only animals who know we must die.
From my point of view, humour and irony include tragedy; they're two sides of the same coin.
I am not an artist.
It's not my job to tell people what a work means.
Warhol was proof that you can be revolutionary without being militant.
I am fascinated by the idea of employing beautiful images as a device to convey something extremely disturbing in an apparently harmless way.
I never talk about my work as a joke.
Art is about forgetting all these feelings, good and bad, and trying to understand what acts will last longer, which symbols will remain in history. It's a question of perspective: The further you get from the past, the more concrete and plausible it seems.
Never give an artist like me carte blanche: he would think it's simply toilet paper.
Sometimes I see myself as a locked box - very detached from myself and others. But I feel lucky, because I am the owner of my time, and you cannot buy time.
I'm terrorized by a fear of failure. Failure is always there.
My aim is to be as open and as incomprehensible as possible. There has to be a perfect balance between open and shut.
I was jealous of colleagues when I should have been happy for them. I decided to save my energy. If you think they are great works, you should buy them.
I like to produce work for specific places, and it is difficult to do repeat shows in the same space.
If you are searching to figure out what is true and what is not, you will have a sad life. It means you have too much time, and you should do a hobby - like collecting art.
Every work of art is a great promise of escape and, therefore, like an open invitation.
I get up in the morning and get to bed at night, and between, I bring equivalent dedication to everything I do, with a horror of the inaccurate and the half-baked.
Based on my experience, it's considerably difficult to force a donkey into doing something it perceives to be dangerous for whatever reason.
Gianni Agnelli was a sharp mind, and most of his interviews carried meanings between the lines that only now are fully readable.
Contemporary art will never achieve the audience of football, pop music, or television, so I think we should stop comparing its possible area of influence to that of big mass-media events.
It's even more of a torture not to work than to work.
Art should be able to be innovative without compromising itself. That's why I believe artists should have bigger preoccupations than checking the price tags on their work or becoming curators' darlings.
Made in Catteland is a project that aims to overcome the boundaries of the work of art as we're used to thinking of it: exploring new possibilities of reaching the audience through the creation of new forms of art.
I won't say I'm not fascinated by the way advertising works. I like the sleekness. But a picture in advertising doesn't last too long. They have to work for 30 seconds. And I'd like to reach at least two minutes. This is my goal: to break that two-minute record.
Some do design in order to try to solve others' problems, while others make art in order to give others his problems.
Provocations are like a Molotov cocktail. They only work one time out of ten, but when it works, it can also be dangerous for the arm that is throwing it. It's the price that has to be paid.
Money is a bad friend. Don't ever do anything for money.
Work was always necessary to survive. Then I decided the goal should be to survive without working. But now I have much more work than I had before. Hunting for freedom, I've found the real prison. but at least it's a prison I've chosen for myself.
I work more with my stomach than my brain.
Damien Hirst knows how to drive super-fast cars... I love my bicycle.
I don't like the idea of having a public image. In the end, you have an image of someone, which becomes true whether it is or not.
I would never make fun of anyone who is obviously disabled who cannot defend himself, like Donald Trump.
I would describe myself as a tallish, shy, middle-aged man who equally loves his work and his freedom. And a good liar!
When I was very young, I had to start to working to help my family, while my friends were studying. Since then, I have felt the urgency to escape from every dependency situation.
Laughter is a Trojan horse to enter into direct contact with the unconscious, strike the imagination, and trigger visceral reactions.
Truth is so hard to tell, it sometimes needs fiction to make it plausible.
The best art is on the street.
