“The old murals came from the heart,” Zima said. “I painted on a huge scale because that was what the subject matter seemed to demand.”

— Alastair Reynolds , Zima Blue

“It was good work,” I said.
“It was hack work. Huge, loud, demanding, popular, but ultimately soulless. Just because it came from the heart didn’t make it good.”
Zima Blue (p. 395)
Short fiction, Zima Blue and Other Stories (2006)

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Alastair Reynolds 198

British novelist and astronomer 1966

Tomasz Vetulani (1965) Polish artist

There is no threat. Weapons and colour https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqfjr78Pyfs, video, Galeria Olympia, 23 Novmeber 2017 (in Polish)

“I paint directly – then it's said to be an exact copy; and not art, probably because there's no perspective or shading. It doesn't look like a painting of something, it looks like the thing itself. Instead of looking like a painting of a billboard – the way a w:Reginald Marsh would look – Pop Art seems to be the actual thing. It is intensification, a stylistic intensification of the excitement which the subject matter has for me; but the style is, as you said, cool.”

Roy Lichtenstein (1923–1997) American pop artist

Source: 1960's, What is Pop Art? Interviews with eight painters' (1963), pp. 25-27

“.. the word 'abstract' comes from the light tower of the philosophers.... one of their spotlights that they have particularly focused on 'Art'....(abstraction was) not so much what you could paint but rather what you could not paint. You could not paint a house or a tree or a mountain. It was then that subject matter came into existence as something you ought not have.”

Willem de Kooning (1904–1997) Dutch painter

Willem de Kooning, MOMA Bull., pp. 4, 6; as quoted in Abstract Expressionist Painting in America, W.C, Seitz, Cambridge Massachusetts, 1983, p. 104.
1980's

“Soon after completing the 'La Combe' series [circa 1950] I had a dream in which I was assisted by many children on a scaffold, painting a huge mural made up of square panels fitted together. Each panel was being painted by a child very quickly in long black strokes with huge brushes. The work was done in seconds. Upon waking I immediately made a reminder sketch of the mural. Later I made a drawing of many ink strokes, which I cut up into twenty squares and placed at random in a four-by-five grid..”

Ellsworth Kelly (1923–2015) American painter, sculptor, and printmaker

as quoted in "Ellsworth Kelly", John Coplands; Harry N. Abrams, New York, 1971
1969 - 1980

“Decoration. Very rapidly executed, at one go, spontaneously [reflection of making a mural on the site for the terrace plaza hotel in Cincinnati]. What takes a long time in my case is the work of silent reflection; it is impossible for me to predict the duration of this preparatory period. You have to keep in mind that it is by no means a matter of just doing a large picture, and though it will not be possible to paint a true mural by attacking the wall directly, in fresco, to do so will require persistence while maintaining, as much as possible, the spirit of the great tradition of mural painting. I shall have to go to Cincinnati in advance as soon as I can, to view the architecture and its environs, because otherwise I would only create an easel painting in large format.”

Joan Miró (1893–1983) Catalan painter, sculptor, and ceramicist

In a letter to Pierre Matisse, 26 January 1946; as quoted in Calder Miro, ed. Elizabeth Hutton Turner / Oliver Wick; Philip Wilson Publishers, London 2004, p. 70
1940 - 1960

“For example, Rothko and I came to an agreement on the question of the subject matter; if we were to do something which could develop in some direction other than the accepted directions of that time, it would be necessary to use different subjects to begin with, and 1942, we embarked on a series of paintings that attempted to use mythological subject matter, preferably from Greek mythology. I did a series of paintings on the theme of Oedipus and Rothko did a series of paintings on other Greek themes….. this offered a possibility of a way out [of a. o. Social Realism and Cubism ]”

Adolph Gottlieb (1903–1974) American artist

In an interview (March 1960) with David Sylvester, edited for broadcasting by the BBC first published in ‘Living Arts, June 1963; as quoted in Interviews with American Artists, by David Sylvester; Chatto & Windus, London 2001, p. 31
1960s

“The subject matter is unimportant, provided what I have done is interesting as a painting. I chose the modern era because it is the one I understand best; I find it more alive for people who are alive.”

Frédéric Bazille (1841–1870) French painter

as quoted in: 'Frédéric Bazille and the Birth of Impressionism', Corrinne Chong, PhD -independent scholar http://www.19thc-artworldwide.org/autumn17/chong-reviews-frederic-bazille-and-the-birth-of-impressionism
Quotes, undated

“What seems most significant to me about our movement is that we have freed painting from the importance of the subject. I am at liberty to paint flowers and call them flowers, without their needing to tell a story.”

Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841–1919) French painter and sculptor

Quoted in: Charles Altieri (1989) Painterly Abstraction in Modernist American Poetry, p. 169: Talking about the movement of Impressionism.
undated quotes

“You can't be in an unconscious state and paint. Because whatever is in your mind, and not the subject matter, but the feelings that you have related to that subject matter, is what you're going to paint. So, the beginning is not actually painting, you know. The beginning of painting is not you put down green, and then you like pink, and you put down pink.
Painting's not about that anymore than music is about this sound and that sound.... And it's something that drives you to expression. And it's irresistible.”

Agnes Martin (1912–2004) American artist

1974
1970's, interview, K. Horsfield & L. Blumenthal

“I believe easel painting to be a dying form, and the tendency of modern feeling is toward the wall picture or mural..”

Jackson Pollock (1912–1956) American artist

In his application for a grant given by the Guggenheim Foundation 1944; as quoted in Abstract expressionism, Barbara Hess, Taschen Köln, 2006, p. 9
1940's

“The old murals came from the heart,” Zima said. “I painted on a huge scale because that was what the subject matter seemed to demand.”

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