a certain kind of now (29 September 2016)

Often to understand, we have to look into emptiness.

- Michelangelo Antonioni

Jeff Wall, Outburst, 1989


The spontaneous is the most beautiful thing that can appear in a picture, but nothing in art appears less spontaneously than that.

- Jeff Wall

Jeff Wall, Octopus, 1990

I'm aware that the subjects I choose do have meaning, but over the years I've found that understanding these meanings is less important for me. My burning issue is how to make the next picture good.

- Jeff Wall *

Jeff Wall, Hotels, Carrall Street, Vancouver, 2007

Jeff Wall, Diagonal Composition, 1993

If you are capable of making good pictures it’s immoral not to do so, for whatever reason or excuse you might give.

- Jeff Wall

Jeff Wall,  A Sudden Gust of Wind (after Hokusai), 1993


I think of my work as sober, but I don't find it sad or melancholy. I try to contemplate things that happen, whatever they happen to be. And I like to work with commonplace material because I think there's nothing as complicated as the commonplace. It's magical to be able to make a picture that imparts a strong aesthetic experience in spite of unprepossessing subject matter. It's much more interesting to conjure something out of nothing.

- Jeff Wall *

Jeff Wall, Untangling, 1994, printed 2006


* Jeff Wall: Conjuring something out of nothing (The Telegraph)


Jeff Wall's photography: Many indecisive moments (The Economist)