There's always something chest-beating and phony about it. What we get is a selective view, determined partly by practical considerations, from the RA's financial situation to the fact the National Gallery owns several Rembrandt self-portraits, and partly by the views of curators. But perhaps the biggest lie is the one that this exhibition is urgent here, now. Whenever there's a big exhibition it's as if this artist had just been discovered, and we all need to get along there or miss out. This is crushing, it's the opposite of the love of art.
Love is personal, it is complicated.
You can't hurry love. We're not just talking about old art. And because Sensation was a huge hit in Britain and then toured the world, it became the official compilation of 1990s British art. You can spend a lifetime looking at a favourite artist's work, and over a lifetime is how it should be done - as a romance, a relationship. There's something about the big show that erases the moments of discovery, surprise, bafflement that make art live.