Remember that a piece of art can be important whilst not being particularly good.
Imagine if you had a museum devoted to the appreciation of mobile phones.
there would be some which were interesting because they were really well designed and looked really nice, sure but there would be others that it was important to have in the museum because they demonstrated some movement or moment in phone technology, design or use that was interesting and flavoured some other part.

Clearly there are going to be pieces of art that leave us cold. I don't enjoy Cy Twobley's work for instance but I am able to appreciate its place in the grander scheme of art and understanding it allows me to better understand some other artists like Robert Rauschenberg or Jasper Johns, whose work I really enjoy.

then you start to see connections and patterns emerge that allow the work to convey other meanings.

I used to not like Barnet Newman's work very much but I read a lot about some other Jewish American painters at the time and seeing Newman's work and its message within that context gave it a meaning and power I hadn't appreciated in it before.

You want to know what critics thought about the work, go and read what they said! Most critics hate new things, some of the most vociferous and unpleasant things I've read by critics have been against artworks which are now considered masterpieces in their various fields.
( WormuIus, Wed 21 Sep 2011, 13:45, Reply)