“I believe that the great painters with their intellect as master have attempted to force this unwilling medium of paint and canvas into a record of their emotions. I find any digression from this large aim leads me to boredom.”

—  Edward Hopper

1911 - 1940, Notes on Painting - Edward Hopper (1933)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update Sept. 14, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "I believe that the great painters with their intellect as master have attempted to force this unwilling medium of paint…" by Edward Hopper?
Edward Hopper photo
Edward Hopper48
prominent American realist painter and printmaker 1882–1967

Related quotes

Edward Hopper photo

“Well, I have a very simple method of painting. It's to paint directly on the canvas without any funny business, as it were, and I use almost pure turpentine to start with, adding oil as I go along until the medium becomes pure oil. I use as little oil as I can possibly help, and that's my method. It's very simple... Yes, linseed oil. I used to use poppy oil, but I have heard that poppy oil is given to cracking pigment too, so I use it no longer... I find linseed oil and white lead the most satisfactory mediums.”

Edward Hopper (1882–1967) prominent American realist painter and printmaker

1941 - 1967
Source: 'Oral history interview with Edward Hopper' (1959, June 17), conducted by John Morse; 'Archives of American Art', Smithsonian Institution

Patrick Swift photo

“No real painter ever wants be known through any other medium than his painting.”

Patrick Swift (1927–1983) British artist

The Artist Speaks (1951)

Leopold Stokowski photo

“A painter paints his pictures on canvas. But musicians paint their pictures on silence.”

Leopold Stokowski (1882–1977) British conductor

Addressing an audience at Carnegie Hall, as quoted in The New York Times (11 May 1967); often this is quoted without the humorous final sentence.
Context: A painter paints his pictures on canvas. But musicians paint their pictures on silence. We provide the music, and you provide the silence.

Jackson Pollock photo

“My painting does not come from the easel. I hardly ever stretch my canvas before painting. I prefer to tack the unstretched canvas to the hard wall or the floor. I need the resistance of a hard surface. On the floor I am more at ease. I feel nearer, more a part of the painting, since this way I can walk around it, work from the four sides and literally be in the painting. This is akin to the method of the Indian sand painters of the West.”

Jackson Pollock (1912–1956) American artist

Quote from 'Possibilities' Vol. 1, no 1, winter 1947-48, p. 79; as cited in 'Jackson Pollock: is he the greatest living painter in the United States?', in 'Life' (8 August 1949), pp. 42-45
1940's

“I can not evolve any concrete theory about painting. What happens on the canvas is unpredictable and surprising to me.”

William Baziotes (1912–1963) American painter

Source: Posthumous quotes, Abstract Expressionist Painting in America, (1983), p. 135 : original source: 'Willem de Kooning', in 'Moma Bulletin' pp. 6,7

Prevale photo

“Any difficulty, large or small, stimulates the intellect to find a solution.”

Prevale (1983) Italian DJ and producer

Original: (it) Qualsiasi difficoltà, piccola o grande che sia, stimola l'intelletto a trovare una soluzione.
Source: prevale.net

Frank Stella photo

“I didn't want to mask variations; I didn't want to record a path. I wanted to get the paint out of the can and onto the canvas... I tried to keep the paint as good as it was in the can.”

Frank Stella (1936) American artist

Source: Quotes, 1960 - 1970, Questions to Stella and Judd' - September 1966, p. 121

Jopie Huisman photo

“The smaller the world, the better I feel. When the reed is around me, evil has disappeared from the world. I really shall paint the reed next year, I've seriously decided. A small area of reeds with some water under. And then it will appear [on the canvas] exactly in the way it will make one quiet. I will paint it outdoors because I don't have any imagination - by the way, I would find myself very cheeky if I did. I have nothing to add, I have nothing in me and I believe I must be well aware of that because that is my limitation, as a consequence of my temporality.”

Jopie Huisman (1922–2000) Dutch painter

translation, Fons Heijnsbroek, 2018
version in original Dutch / citaat van Jopie Huisman, in het Nederlands: Hoe kleiner de wereld, hoe beter ik me voel. Het riet om mij heen, dan is het kwade de wereld uit. Volgend jaar zal ik dat riet schilderen, ik heb het mij heilig voorgenomen. Een stukje riet met een stukje water eronder. En dan komt het er precies zo op dat je er stil van wordt. Ik schilder het buiten, want fantasie heb ik niet en dat zou ik trouwens een grote brutaliteit van mijzelf vinden. Ik heb er niets aan toe te voegen, ik heb niets in mij en ik geloof dat ik dat mijzelf goed bewust moet zijn, want als gevolg van mijn tijdelijkheid is dat mijn beperktheid.
Source: Jopie Huisman', 1981, p. 118

Frank Stella photo

“I can't stress enough how important it is, if you are interested at all in painting, to look and to look a great deal at painting. There is no other way to find out about painting. After looking comes imitating. In my own case it was at first largely a technical immersion. How did Kline put down that color? Why did Guston leave the canvas bare at the edges? Why did H. Frankenthaler used unsized canvas. And so on.”

Frank Stella (1936) American artist

Source: Quotes, 1960 - 1970, The Pratt lecture (1960), p. 113

John Steinbeck photo

“I have come to believe that a great teacher is a great artist and that there are as few as there are any other great artists. It might even be the greatest of the arts since the medium is the human mind and spirit.”

John Steinbeck (1902–1968) American writer

"...like captured fireflies" (1955); also published in America and Americans and Selected Nonfiction (2003), p. 142

Related topics