No matter how dreadful their work may seem, keep these things in mind before you dismiss them as artists:
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You may not understand their creative project. (You may not be the best audience member / reader / consumer of their work.)
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They may be developing in a way that isn’t obvious.
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Their work may be in response to something you don’t know about / don’t understand.
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Their work may take some time to appreciate. (Not a bad thing at all.)
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They may have deliberately violated artistic conventions and you can’t see it yet.
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They may be about to produce something else that you will like. Or maybe they already did.
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The piece / performance in question might be functioning as a stepping stone or a link in a much longer series of pieces. How deeply have you studied this person’s work?
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The context of the work may be interfering with how you receive the work.
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Your emotional / aesthetic background may be interfering with how you receive the work.
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You may see the work differently if you come back to it later (after a sandwich and a nap).
We can’t know what waits to be born from the hearts and minds of our fellow humans. All we can do is try to understand what we experience with our senses, keeping in mind that to respond to creative work is to participate in its existence (and, by extension, its creation). This carries a lot of responsibility above and beyond casual momentary consumption. As such, it is best to withhold judgment until we have thought about the work for a while—because we are neither infallible nor prescient. And if we are positioned to pass judgment on perceived flaws in the work, let us instead talk sincerely about what the work is doing right, about what it inspires in us, and about what we would like to see happen next.
The Writing Expedition 