Postmodernism does not facilitate better art. It rationalizes inferior art by wrapping it in words - a suit of armor with nobody inside.
Truth is not always hard to find; it is often staring you in the face. The problem with truth is that it is hard to believe. It is even harder to get other people to believe.
Art is like a butterfly fluttering in a meadow. Analysis of art is like a butterfly on a pin. Each has its value, but we must always be aware of the difference, and what is gained or lost.
Most people find facts irritating. Facts interfere with their systems of denial.
We learn to lie by believing words rather than experience.
Making art is like swimming underwater in a blindfold.
Good new art may not look like art. Inspiration doesn't follow style, it creates it.
Stale artifacts of the past' are always 'active components of the present moment' when they are experienced in the present moment.
Most 'profound truths' are just timely ideas.
Art flows more easily when you are not thinking about what 'should' be in it or how it 'should' be done. The Impressionists taught us to look and see, not assume.
When you write something new about science, other scientists may not like it but they pay attention because it is subject to proof. When you write something new about art, it is subject only to the reader's discomfort, and will probably be rejected.
We must turn away from work that replaces experience and pleasure with explanation.
Purplish brown? Let's agree it / is a color so bad we all flee it / it has no good use / so let's name it Puce / from the sound we make when we see it.
Without the eye, the head is blind. Without the head, the eye is adrift.
No high-minded painter of the last fifty years has been able to come to terms with his art without coming to terms with the problem of cubism.
The art consensus is not criteria, it is convenience.
There is no best way to make art, but there are a lot of better ways.
When anyone can produce dreck or publish gibberish, and not only get away with it but be celebrated for it, the discipline is no longer a discipline, and it will get no respect.
Limitation of means is a precondition of excellence. Creative freedom chooses its limitations. Destructive freedom rejects them heedlessly.
When you have made a good painting, don't do another like it, but remember the process, what you did, what you were thinking and feeling.
Good art, no matter how simple or casual-seeming, always carries a high density of choice.
Too much freedom inhibits choice. Constructive narrowness clarifies choice.
When realistic images or patterns are seen in an abstract painting, they are often parallels brought about by processes in painting which echo processes in nature.
If we see an object as a bowl, it may inhibit seeing it as craft, just as seeing it as craft might inhibit seeing it as art. See first; name later.
Always let intuitive perception precede analysis.
