If I declare it to be so, then this is a portrait.

There is no reason not to consider the world as one gigantic painting.

You begin with the possibilities of the material.

I don't really trust ideas - especially good ones... Rather, I put my trust in the materials that confront me, because they put me in touch with the unknown.

The only thing that I could get with chance, and I never was able to use it, was that I would end up with something quite geometric or the spirit that I was interested in, indulging in, was gone.

It is neither Art for Art, nor Art against Art. I am for Art, but for Art that has nothing to do with Art. Art has everything to do with life, but it has nothing to do with Art.

I've not been cursed with talent, which could be a great inhibitor.

An empty canvas is full.

The artist's job is to be a witness to his time in history.

I don't think of myself as making art. I do what I do because I want to, because painting is the best way I've found to get along with myself.

Even at this late date, I go into my studio, and I think 'Is this going to be it? Is it the end?' You see, nearly everything terrorizes me. When an artist loses that terror, he's through.

it was all I had, all I've ever had, the only currency, the only proof that I was alive. Memory." p 380

My imagination can picture no fairer happiness than to continue living for art.

Do not think a man has done his full duty when he has performed the work assigned him. A man will never rise if he does only this. Promotion comes from exceptional work.

I don't want anything to take away from wrestling.

Let me tell you that every misery I miss is a new blessing. [Not only be grateful for the good that you have but also for the bad you don't!]

All that counts is the truth. Without it you're basically just juggling people's daft ideas.

The long-term cost of a welfare society is the infantilization of the population.

When it comes to going after what you love in life, don't take no for an answer.

If there were no valleys of sadness and death, we could never really appreciate the sunshine of happiness on the mountain top.

I really am thankful that I got to do The Proposal movie the right way with people who taught me how to do comedy better.