“I have always been concerned with painting that simultaneously insists on a flat surface and then denies it.”

— Helen Frankenthaler

Quote from 'The collection', MOMA, online 1 http://www.moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=80139 <br class="br">1990s - 2000s

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

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Helen Frankenthaler46

American artist 1928–2011

Donald Judd (1928–1994) artist

Source: 1960s, "Specific Objects," 1965, p. 76; As quoted in: De gids, Vol. 131, Nr. 1-5, (1968), p. 262

“I see the possibilities of a new kind of painting. With free surfaces, the goal I was always steering towards.”

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (1880–1938) German painter, sculptor, engraver and printmaker

In a letter, 1923; as quoted in Expressionism, de:Wolf-Dieter Dube; Praeger Publishers, New York, 1973, p. 52
1920's

“I don't mind hidden depths but I insist that there be a surface.”

James Nicoll (1961) Canadian fiction reviewer

Livejournal post http://james-nicoll.livejournal.com/176181.html (2005) <br class="br">2000s

“My paintings are always images of my whole psychic makeup. You cannot deny yourself. You ask, am I painting myself? I'd been a swindler if I did otherwise. I'd be denying my existence as an artist. I've been also asked, what do you want to convey? And I say, nothing but my own nature... I am nothing but an optimist.”

Hans Hofmann (1880–1966) American artist

1960s
Source: Hofmann, in Ashton, (1960's) Twetieth Century Artists on Art, 218

“Flat or round, there has always been hate in the world.”

Tanith Lee Tales from the Flat Earth

Book 3 “The World’s Lure”, Chapter 5 “A Ship with Wings” (p. 167)
Tales from the Flat Earth, Night’s Master (1978)

“This calls for an explanation and it may be this, that no painting, however good it seems to us is anything in itself, except chemicals smeared on a flat surface. The value in the work of art is in the spectator, you see, and a painting has no bigger value than the mental and intellectual forces it arouses in the spectator.”

Asger Jorn (1914–1973) Danish artist

Jorn's quote, from his speech at the library of Silkeborg, September l0th 1953 (translated from an unpublished Danish manuscript by Guy Atkins) ; as quoted on the website of the Jorn Museum Articles by Jorn http://www.museumjorn.dk/en/article_presentation.asp?AjrDcmntId=255 <br class="br">1949 - 1958, Various sources

“I project on the surface; that is, the essence of the subject must always become visible, even if this is impossible in nature, which is not adapted to this relief style. The absence of foreshortening also plays a crucial part in the process... For I have discovered a very small, undisputed, personal possession: a particular sort of three-dimensional representation on the flat surface... I am my style.”

Paul Klee (1879–1940) German Swiss painter

Quote (July 1902), # 425, in The Diaries of Paul Klee, translation: Pierre B. Schneider, R. Y. Zachary and Max Knight; publisher, University of California Press, 1964
1895 - 1902

“As far as I am concerned, I learned this technique [the use of flat areas, painted in bright color - sometimes in contrasting juxtaposition, sometimes like pieces of colored glass in heavy dark outlines] from Kandinsky and, at the same time, from the glass paintings of the Bavarian peasants of the Murneau area, who had painted for centuries in this style.”

Gabriele Münter (1877–1962) German painter

Source: Interview by Edouard Roditi (1958), p. 117

“The first painting to appear with an affirmation of simultaneity was mine and had the following title: 'Simultaneous visions', [Boccioni painted in 1911]. It was exhibited in the galerie Bernheim in Paris, and in the same exhibition my Futurist painter friends also appeared with similar experiments in simultaneity.”

Umberto Boccioni (1882–1916) Italian painter and sculptor

Boccioni's quote on early realized simultaneity in his art; as quoted in Futurism, ed. Didier Ottinger; Centre Pompidou / 5 Continents Editions, Milan, 2008, p. 458.
1914 - 1916, Pittura e scultura futuriste' Milan, 1914

“This is the greatest honour I have ever received in my life. Peace has always been my greatest concern.”

Pablo Casals (1876–1973) Catalan cellist and conductor

Medal of Peace acceptance
Context: This is the greatest honour I have ever received in my life. Peace has always been my greatest concern. Yet in my childhood I learned to love it. My mother—an exceptional, brilliant woman — used to speak to me about it when I was still a child, because in those years there were also a lot of wars. What is more, I am a Catalan. Today, a province of Spain. But what has been Catalonia? Catalonia has been the greatest nation in the world. I will tell you why. Catalonia has had the first parliament, much before England. Catalonia had the first United Nations. All the authorities of Catalonia in the Eleventh Century met in a city of France, at that time Catalonia, to speak about peace, at the Eleventh Century. Peace in the world and against, against, against war, the inhumanity of the wars. So I am so happy, so happy, to be with you today. That is why the United Nations, which works solely towards the peace ideal, is in my heart, because anything to do with peace goes straight to my heart.

“I have always been concerned with painting that simultaneously insists on a flat surface and then denies it.”

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Helen Frankenthaler46

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