*an ongoing series of quotations – mostly from artists, to artists – that offers wisdom, inspiration, and advice for the sometimes lonely road we are on.

HM: I’ve never met many people; I’ve never much sought out older painters, first because I didn’t want to disturb them and then because what an artist says is so insignificant, I find, compared to what he does. The same phrases can so easily fit different things when you’re talking about the visual arts.

You can’t describe them. All you can do is create a kind of analogy using words. But even then the words have to reach the same part of the spectator that’s ready and waiting for them.

Henri Matisse in Chatting With Matisse: The Lost 1941 Interview, Henri Matisse with Pierre Courthion, edited by Serge Guilbault

Comments are welcome!