Al, that's it exactly
A great deal of contemporary (not Modern) art is just like free-form jazz - ground-breaking and very often academic. You need to know something of the rules and history of music or in the case of the art, art history.
It's no surprise that public taste tends to be many decades behind practising artists. What's the most common print that people have in their houses? Impressionist paintings....painted about 100 years ago.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Tue 6 May 2008, 15:14, Reply)