Al Held, Visiting Artist Lecture 1988

In a slide presentation painter Al Held discusses the evolution of his painting philosophy, working method and style from very early in his career to about fifteen months prior to the lecture. In addition to fielding questions about the value of assistants in the mural painting process and how computers might relate to his work, Held explores the nature of art and what he sees as the Modernist tendency to separate subject from content. He also expresses the opinion that contemporary art has degenerated into sign-making, gesture-making and inventive strategies whose only purpose is to secure for the artist a place in history, a trend which he attributes primarily to John Cage and Marcel Duchamp.