"Where is the highly talented painter without some primitive belief that magic is a presence in all artwork? .. . . . . "Let us assume that magic can adhere, for example, to a painting -- particularly if it is a fine work, and one owns it -- because the artwork can now be contemplated a thousand times rather than on a few occasions in a museum. Each time the owner comes to appreciate more in the composition than he glimpsed before, the painting takes on an added endowment. .It becomes a center of meaning, it stimulates new thought, it induces energy in the viewer -- that is to say it has assumed magical powers. (Magic offers priceless energy) . . . . . Whatever provides us with continually enhanced connotation is magically endowed.

"This is, of course, not true of all paintings we own, or of politicans who bore us, friends and lovers who depress us, rituals that weary us, or of relations in which we lose interest. .Repetition can also kill the soul, and so a ceremony, a person, or an object is able to enrich us only when its nature, it's artful nature, rewards further study or calls for more relationship -- that is to say, its nature transcends familiarity. .And that, indeed may be why good poetry is more magical than good prose -- the message is more elusive, more compressed, and more responsive to sensuous study." -- Norman Mailer in his book: Portrait of Picasso as a Young Man, Warner Books, NY, 1996.

"I know quite certainly that I myself have no special talent; curiosity, obsession and dogged endurance, combined with self-criticism have brought me to my ideas." -- Albert Einstein

"In my opinion, I am often rich as Croesus, not in money, but (though it doesn't happen every day) rich, because I have found in my work something to which I can devote myself heart and soul, and which gives inspiration and significance to life." -- Vincent Van Gogh, in a letter to his brother, Theo, mid March 1883

"What I want to make is a drawing which will not be exactly understood by everyone: the figure essentially simplified with intentional neglect of those details which do not belong to the real character, and are only accidental." -- Vincent Van Gogh, in a letter to his brother, Theo, July, 1883

"I study nature, so as not to do foolish things, to remain reasonable; however, I don't care so much whether my color is exactly the same, as long as it looks beautiful on my canvas, as beautiful as it looks in nature." -- Vincent Van Gogh, in a letter to his brother, Theo, October 1885

"I have nature and art and poetry, and if that is not enough, what is enough?" -- Vincent Van Gogh

"The dignity of the artist lies in his duty of keeping awake the sense of wonder in the world." -- G. K. Chesterton

In reference to a drawing he is working on:

"For the moment it is looking rather good, but I am afraid I'll spoil it. .But one must not be afraid of that either, otherwise one never succeeds." -- Vincent Van Gogh, in a letter to his brother, Theo, June 10, 1883

"The moment you cheat for the sake of beauty, you know you're an artist." -- Max Jacob

"When I judge art, I take my painting and put it next to a God made object like a tree or flower. .If it clashes, it is not art." -- Marc Chagall

"I think a painter is happy because he is in harmony with nature as soon as he can express a little of what he sees.....But I tell you that dissatisfaction with bad work, the failure of things, the difficulties of technique, can make one dreadfully melancholy. .I can assure you that I am sometimes terribly discouraged when I think of Millet, Israels, Breton, DeGroux, so many others, Herkomer, for instance; one only knows what these fellows really are when one is at work oneself. .And then to swallow this despair and melancholy, to be patient with oneself as one is -- not in order to sit down and rest, but to struggle on notwithstanding thousands of shortcomings and faults and the uncertainty of conquering them -- all these things are the reason why a painter is unhappy too." -- Vincent Van Gogh in a letter to his brother Theo, November 27, 1882.

"The function of the artist is not to duplicate what is obviously beautiful, for nature has done it more wonderfully than man, with all his techniques, can ever hope to do. .The object of art is to create beauty that doesn't already exist, although it may be -- and very often is -- inspired by things beautiful in themselves." -- Michael Carver in his book, Painting in Oil by the 5-Color Method, McGraw-Hill, NY - 1961.

"The person who has had little experience in looking at pictures may have the right to say that a painting is beautiful or ugly, but that doesn't necessarily make it so. How many times have people been heard to say: 'I don't know anything about art, but I know what I like.' .Many people think that the reproduction of a pretty scene is the end of art. .Others like paintings of horses, dogs, or sailboats simply because they happen to like horses, dogs, or sailboats, and it is difficult to convince them that such paintings are not necessarily beautiful. .The fact that they don't look much different from colored photographs seems to have no effect on the admiration these people bestow on pictures of this sort. .For they are 'handpainted,' and that seems to mean something." -- Michael Carver in his book, Painting in Oil by the 5-Color Method, McGraw-Hill, NY - 1961.

"Finishing a painting demands a heart of steel: everything requires a decision, and I find difficulties where I least expect them. .It is at such moments that one fully realizes one’s own weaknesses and how many incomplete, or impossible to complete, parts comprise what man calls a 'finished' or completed work" -- Eugene Delacroix

"The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without work." -- Emile Zola

"All colors are the friends of their neighbors and the lovers of their opposites." -- W. H. Auden

"With age, art and life become one." -- Georges Braque

"I am old and ill, and I have sworn to die painting." -- Paul Cezanne