1.
Making art is like swimming underwater in a blindfold.
Walter Darby Bannard
2.
An ivory tower is a fine place as long as the door is open.
Walter Darby Bannard
3.
Most people find facts irritating. Facts interfere with their systems of denial.
Walter Darby Bannard
4.
No high-minded painter of the last fifty years has been able to come to terms with his art without coming to terms with the problem of cubism.
Walter Darby Bannard
5.
What is sublime? / the artist said. / I haven't time / to be well read. / To be sub lime / I'll place, instead, / green citrus fruit / upon my head.
Walter Darby Bannard
6.
Always let intuitive perception precede analysis.
Walter Darby Bannard
7.
Postmodernism is Modernism with Alzheimer's.
Walter Darby Bannard
8.
Writing about art is only useful when it leads to the experience of art.
Walter Darby Bannard
9.
When you are painting a landscape, assume the painting is real and the landscape is an illusion.
Walter Darby Bannard
10.
Stale artifacts of the past' are always 'active components of the present moment' when they are experienced in the present moment.
Walter Darby Bannard
11.
Postmodernism is silly and joyless at the same time.
Walter Darby Bannard
12.
When anything goes, everything goes.
Walter Darby Bannard
13.
When anything can be art, art is not much of anything.
Walter Darby Bannard
14.
A clear idea about the nature of quality in art will always result in inferior art tailored to it.
Walter Darby Bannard
15.
Most 'profound truths' are just timely ideas.
Walter Darby Bannard
16.
Science is a matter of adjusting language to explain material reality. Art is a matter of adjusting material reality to create a sense of life.
Walter Darby Bannard
17.
Live to paint, don't paint to live.
Walter Darby Bannard
18.
A critic without a good eye is a eunuch in a harem.
Walter Darby Bannard
19.
Postmodernism lives in the academy, where words abandon reality to serve ambition, and reputations rise on hot air.
Walter Darby Bannard
20.
Art is too popular. If plumbing was as popular as art is we would have amateur plumbers running around brandishing wrenches and Roto-Rooters, climbing in and out of sewers and writing gibberish about pipe systems. And none of our our toilets would work.
Walter Darby Bannard
21.
Art flows more easily when you are not thinking about what 'should' be in it or how it 'should' be done. The Impressionists taught us to look and see, not assume.
Walter Darby Bannard
22.
Power is like money. Some know how to get it; few know how to use it.
Walter Darby Bannard
23.
Don't apologize, justify or rationalize bad art or bad writing. If you do, you are part of it.
Walter Darby Bannard
24.
When good ideas get put to bad use, it is the fault of the user, not the idea.
Walter Darby Bannard
25.
Asking art to express ideas is like asking a Sumo wrestler to play charades.
Walter Darby Bannard
26.
There is no best way to make art, but there are a lot of better ways.
Walter Darby Bannard
27.
When inspiration dies, imitation thrives.
Walter Darby Bannard
28.
Don't explain, enjoy.
Walter Darby Bannard
29.
The first duty of intelligence is to recognize the obvious.
Walter Darby Bannard
30.
Nothing is as hopeless as trying to justify art in words.
Walter Darby Bannard
31.
The more freedom artists have to do what they want to do, the more they do what other artists are doing.
Walter Darby Bannard
32.
When imitation goes over big, it isn't imitation, it is a trend.
Walter Darby Bannard
33.
Limitation of means is a precondition of excellence. Creative freedom chooses its limitations. Destructive freedom rejects them heedlessly.
Walter Darby Bannard
34.
Truth is not always hard to find; it is often staring you in the face. The problem with truth is that it is hard to believe. It is even harder to get other people to believe.
Walter Darby Bannard
35.
Originality is way overrated. To make, you need to take. All great artists do.
Walter Darby Bannard
36.
Without the eye, the head is blind. Without the head, the eye is adrift.
Walter Darby Bannard
37.
Convention and restriction release inhibition and provoke the imagination.
Walter Darby Bannard
38.
One needs to be right before getting righteous.
Walter Darby Bannard
39.
Too much freedom inhibits choice. Constructive narrowness clarifies choice.
Walter Darby Bannard
40.
Talent is like a seed which needs fertile soil. There is no less talent now, there is less fertile soil to nourish it.
Walter Darby Bannard
41.
Complete freedom debilitates art but reveals much about character.
Walter Darby Bannard
42.
The art consensus is not criteria, it is convenience.
Walter Darby Bannard
43.
Big minds have big ideas. Small minds use big ideas to justify bad ideas.
Walter Darby Bannard
44.
The struggle to be original hates conformity, but the struggle to be better disregards it, or takes advantage of it to build workable conventions.
Walter Darby Bannard
45.
In art there is no absolute good or bad, but it is absolute that there is good and bad.
Walter Darby Bannard
46.
Trying to be original is futile. If you have no place to go, stay home and cook.
Walter Darby Bannard
47.
When making a painting, only one thing counts: what you do next.
Walter Darby Bannard
48.
Art is not truth. Truth conforms to reality. Art invents reality.
Walter Darby Bannard
49.
There is no regional art. The only region left is the art magazine.
Walter Darby Bannard
50.
There's a big difference between grabbing attention and rewarding attention.
Walter Darby Bannard