Damien Hirst is the Elvis of the English art world, its ayatollah, deliverer, and big-thinking entrepreneurial potty-mouthed prophet and front man. Hirst synthesizes punk, Pop Art, Jeff Koons, Marcel Duchamp, Francis Bacon, and Catholicism. – Jerry Saltz

The price of a work of art has nothing to do with what the work of art is, can do, or is worth on an existential, alchemical level. – Jerry Saltz

Yes, 85 percent of the art you see isnt any good. But everyone has a different opinion about which 85 percent is bad. That in turn creates fantastically unstable interplay and argument. – Jerry Saltz