Famous Quotes by Philip Guston

Usually I am on a work for a long stretch, until a moment arrives when the air of the arbitrary vanishes, and the paint falls into positions that feel destined.

Frustration is one of the great things in art. Satisfaction is nothing.

The painting is not on a surface, but on a plane which is imagined. It moves in a mind. It is not there physically at all.

All these troubles revolve around the irritable mutual dependence of life and art—with their need and contempt for one another.

The difficulties begin when you understand what it is that the soul will not permit the hand to make.

Art needs to prove its right to exist by being critical and self-judging.

No good to paint in the head—what happens is what happens when you put the paint down.

Painting is an illusion, a piece of magic, so what you see is not what you see.

The canvas is a court where the artist is prosecutor, defendant, jury, and judge.

To paint is a possessing rather than a picturing.

Art without a trial disappears at a glance.

I go to the studio every day because one day I may go, and the Angel will be there. What if I don't go and the Angel comes?

Ideas about art don't matter. They collapse anyway in front of the painting.

Usually I am on a work for a long stretch, until a moment arrives when the air of the arbitrary vanishes, and the paint falls into positions that feel destined.

Does art need to represent this variety and contribute to its proliferation?

Painting seems like some kind of peculiar miracle that I need to have again and again.

There is something mysterious in this work that I do not ever want to discover.

The most potent desire for a painter is to see it—to realize what the mind can imagine.

I am a night painter, so when I come into the studio the next morning, the delirium is over.

Believe in this miracle—it is your only hope. To will this transformation is not possible.

In my experience, a painting is not made with colors and paint at all.