The Canvas Is A Court

Painting Is An Illusion, A Piece Of Magic, So What You See Is Not What You See.

But You Begin To Feel As You Go On Working That Unless Painting Proves Its Right To Exist By Being Critical And Self-judging, It Has No Reason To Exist At All - Or Is Not Even Possible. The Canvas Is A Court Where The Artist Is Prosecutor, Defendant, Jury And Judge. Art Without A Trial Disappears At A Glance.

Where Do You Put A Form? It Will Move All Around, Bellow Out And Shrink, And Sometimes It Winds Up Where It Was In The First Place. But At The End It Feels Different, And It Had To Make The Voyage. I Am A Moralist And Cannot Accept What Has Not Been Paid For, Or A Form That Has Not Been Lived Through.

Then You Learn About Composition, You Learn About Old Masters, You Form Certain Ideas About Structure. But The Inhuman Activity Of Trying To Make Some Kind Of Jump Or Leap, Where , The Painting Is Always Saying, 'what Do You Want From Me? I Can Only Be A Painting.' You Have To Go From Part To Part, But You Shouldn't See Yourself Go From Part To Part, That's The Whole Point.

Usually I Draw In Relation To My Painting, What I Am Working On At The Time. On A Lucky Day A Surprising Balance Of Forms And Spaces Will Appear... Making Itself, The Image Taking Hold. This In Turn Moves Me Toward Painting - Anxious To Get To The Same Place, With The Actuality Of Paint And Light.