As quoted in Grandma Moses, American Primitive : Forty Paintings (1947) by Otto Kallir
“Every artist was first an amateur.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American philosopher, essayist, and poet
Progress of Culture (see also: Art) <br class="br">1870s, Society and Solitude (1870), Books, Letters and Social Aims http://www.rwe.org/comm/index.php?option=com_content&task=category&sectionid=5&id=74&Itemid=149 (1876)
Murray Leinster (1896–1975) Novelist, short story writer
Source: Time Tunnel (1964), Chapter 2 (p. 21).
William Baziotes (1912–1963) American painter
from Baziote's text for a symposium in 1954; as quoted in William Baziotes – paintings and drawings, ed. Michael Preble, Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice, 2004, p. 18
1950s
“All artists whether primitive or sophisticated, have been involved in the handling of chaos.”
Barnett Newman (1905–1970) American artist
Source: 1940 - 1950, The Plasmic Image 1. 1943-1945, p. 139
“Amateurs look for inspiration; the rest of us just get up and go to work.”
Chuck Close (1940–2021) American artist
“Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration, the rest of us just get up and go to work.”
Stephen King (1947) American author
Source: On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
Ursula K. Le Guin (1929–2018) American writer
Introduction to The Left Hand of Darkness (1976)
Context: The artist deals in what cannot be said in words. The artist whose medium is fiction does this in words. The novelist says in words what cannot be said in words.
