“I have observed that very often I gain access to a little secret that I have sought for a long time by way of a fortuitous encounter quite unrelated to the matter: for example six months I try to draw a camel in a way that satisfies me, and I make a thousand attempts without ever managing to do it. Then one day it is a drawing of a plump on the label of a pot of jam or the shadow thrown by an ink pot, or something or other equally unrelated to the matter that provides me with the solution. This kind of thing has happened so often that I have acquired the habit of always being on the outlook, and when I want to draw a camel I no longer limit myself, as I once did, to looking (only, fh) at camels..”

—  Jean Dubuffet

Source: posthumous, Jean Dubuffet, Works, writings Interviews, 2006, p. 44; quote in Dubuffet's letter to Jean Paulhan (letter 123)

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Jean Dubuffet 46
sculptor from France 1901–1985

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