For twenty years I read a book a day, from the time I was seven until I was twenty-seven. Robert Motherwell More Quotes by Robert Motherwell More Quotes From Robert Motherwell Every intelligent painter carries the whole culture of modern painting in his head. It is his real subject, of which everything he paints in both an homage and a critique, and everything he says is a gloss. Robert Motherwell intelligentrealculture The abstractness of modern art has to do with how much an enlightened mind rejects of the contemporary social order. Robert Motherwell mindorderart I almost never start with an image. I start with a painting idea, an impulse, usually derived from my own world. Robert Motherwell paintingworldideas If you can't find your inspiration by walking around the block one time, go around two times-but never three. Robert Motherwell blockinspirationtwo It is the medium, or the specific configuration of the medium, that we call a work of art that brings feeling into being. Robert Motherwell being-mefeelingsart Nothing as drastic an innovation as abstract art could have come in to existence, save as the consequence of a most profound, relentless, unquenchable need. The need is for felt experience - intense, immediate, direct, subtle, unified, warm, vivid, rhythmic. Robert Motherwell innovationprofoundart It is true that every artist has his own religion. Robert Motherwell artist It is sometimes forgotten how much wit there is in certain works of abstract art. There is a certain point in undergoing anguish when one encounters the comic. Robert Motherwell encounterssometimesart It's possible to paint a monumental picture that's only 10 inches wide, if one has a sense of scale, which is very different from a sense of size. Robert Motherwell sizedifferentpower One of the most striking aspects of abstract art's appearance is her nakedness, an art stripped bare. Robert Motherwell abstractappearanceart Each brushstroke is a decision. Robert Motherwell choicesdecision Every picture one paints involves not painting others. Robert Motherwell paintingpaintchoices Any incentive to paint is as good as any other. There is no poor subject. Robert Motherwell incentivespaintpoor For me, the sketchbooks are more like a secret and wholly spontaneous jeu d'esprit and some of them I like as much as anything I have ever done. They are invariably without premeditation. I mean not only that I have no plan when I make them, I also have no plan to make them. Robert Motherwell drawingsecretmean In a way, painting is like wine: it is as old, as simple, as primitive and as varied. Like wine, it is a very specific means of expression, with a limited vocabulary, but vast in its expressive potential. Robert Motherwell winesimplemean Most painting in the European tradition was painting the mask. Modern art rejected all that. Our subject matter was the person behind the mask. Robert Motherwell paintingmatterart Abstract expressionism was the first American art that was filled with anger as well as beauty. Robert Motherwell abstractartfirsts I dislike a picture that is too suave or too skilfully done. But, contrariwise, I also dislike a picture that looks too inept or blundering. Robert Motherwell suavedonelooks For a hundred years, modern painters, stubbornly and in the face of incessant hostility, have moved, step by step, leaving superb monuments by the wayside, towards an art of arrangement whose expressiveness depends less and less upon its elements imitating the objects of the external world. Robert Motherwell leavingyearsart I started with straight, basic, symbolic structures. My problem now is the opposite; as I get older, I try to make my paintings more contrapuntal, richer. Robert Motherwell paintingoppositestrying
