Dictated by objects, we tend to see art from the vantage point of the finish line. In the same way that we date a work according to its moment of completion and place it into the generational time frame of when it caught our attention, we accept the sum of a creative endeavor as an indivisible totality unto itself, never quite accounting for the amorphous gestation period and perverse puddle of "inspirations" at its source...

-- Carlo McCormick, in "A Crack in Time" from The Downtown Book, ed. Marvin J. Taylor