Roth's work developed over a fifty-year period with both a diversity and a logical coherence that establish him as one of the most singular and important artists of the second half of the century. Roth shifted from a foundation in classic modernism into the arena of contemporary art, or what has been sometimes called "post-modernism". Testing fundamental issues of authorship and the notion of the self is fused with equally essential questions of the character and nature of art, the materials from which art may be made, as well as the hierarchies and distinctions between media... Roth continually circled back to earlier ideas and processes, reinterpreting and transforming works, so that linearity or closure is consistently defied. Transience and order, destruction and creativity, playful humor and critical inquiry, the abject and beautiful maintain an unrelenting balance throughout his work. A sense of art and life as imminently tragic but boundlessly open distinguishes the career of Dieter Roth, unfolding over decades but remaining alive and relevant today.
— Gary Garrels, Chief Curator, Department of Drawings, and Curator, Department of Painting and Sculpture, The Museum of Modern Art for Roth Time: A Dieter Roth Retrospective, 12 March – 07 June 2014
