I mean that the things I felt and that I enjoyed about certain painter — Philip Guston

"[Painting is..] a kind of war between the moment and the pull of memory.(quote in 1959)"

"Sylvester: What about figuration in a more literal sense?"

"So when the 1960s came along I was feeling split, schizophrenic. The war, what was happening to America, the brutality of the world. What kind of man am I, sitting at home, reading magazines, going into a frustrated fury about everything—and then going into my studio to adjust a red to a blue."

"What I really want to do, it seems, is to paint a single form in the middle of a canvas. ..Thats all a painter is, an image maker, is he not? And one would be a fool, some kind of fool, to want to paint a picture. The most powerful instinct is to paint a single form in its continuity, which is after all what a face is. This happens constantly on a picture. I remember last year I became so nervous about what I was doing that I finally reduce it down to the can on the palette with brushes in it. Well, thats real, tat can with brushes. And I painted the an with brushes sticking in it, and I couldnt tolerate it. I couldnt face it. It was as if it didnt contain enough of my thoughts or feelings about it.. ..I became signs. Exactly.. ..It seemed to become signs and symbols and I dont like signs."

"I got sick and tired of all that Purity! Wanted to tell stories.. [Gustons quote in 1967, referring to his swift from Abstract expressionism to figurative painting]"

"Actually, one of the real problems that always bothers me [in creating a painting] is sustaining a feeling. I mean, when I look at Poussin now, well, I think thats the most incredible thing to maintain the feeling for a year, however long it took Poussin, Im telling you, to paint this vast structure. Bur perhaps that is not given to us now. I dont know... .Actually all all modern art puzzles me. I dont understand it. II really dont. I dont know whether it is fragmentary [as David Sylvester the interviewer suggested]. I have a sickening nostalgia for this other state of sustaining a feeling for months, being able to construct and build a picture. Well Mondrian, I think, did that, of course. He was almost one of the last artists to do that. I wish I could get there."

"The only influences in [the painting The sick Child, Munch painted in his elderly home, remembering very accurate the last days of his dying little sister Sophie] The sick Child.. ..were the ones that come from my home.. ..my childhood and my home. Only someone who knew the conditions at home could possibly understand why there can be no conceivable chance of any other place having played a part – my home is to my art as a midwife is to her children.. ..few painters have ever experienced the full grief of their subject as I did in The sick child. It was not just I who was suffering; it was all my nearest and dearest as well."

"General Franco made it clear that Spain could enter the war only when England was about ready to collapse."

"The Spanish Republic did not find itself free of obligations. For the most part the leaders were Freemasons. Before their duty to their country came their obligations to the Grand Orient. In my opinion, Freemasonry, with all its international influence, is the organization principally responsible for the political ruin of Spain, as well as the murder of Calvo Sotelo, who was executed in accordance with orders from the Grand Secretary of Freemasonry in Geneva."

"Art was what I originally started out to do and music came second at first. I had a year at art college but I left because it was too much like school. I give all my paintings away to people I like."

"Lady Cannons gone to a matinée at the St. Jamess. We had tickets for the first night, but of course she wouldnt use them then. She preferred to go alone in the afternoon, because she detests the theatre, anyhow, and afternoon performances give her a headache. If she does a thing thats disagreeable to her, she likes to do it in the most painful possible way. She has a beautiful nature."

"At first when I saw The Sick Child [in his imagination] her pallid face and the vivid red hair against the pillow – I saw something that vanished when I tried to paint it. I ended up with a picture on the canvas which, although I was pleased with it, bore little relationship to what I had seen.. ..In the space of that year [1885 – 1886], scratching it out, just letting the paint flow, endlessly I tried to recapture what I had seen for the first time – the pale transparent skin against the linen sheets, the trembling lips, the shaking hands. I repainted the painting numerous times – scratched it out – let it become blurred in the medium – and tried again and again to catch the first impression – the transparent pale skin against the canvas – the trembling mouth – the trembling hands. I had done the chair [in which his sister Sophie had died] with the glass too often. It distracted me from doing the head. – When I saw the picture I could only make out the glass and the surroundings. – Should I remove it completely? – No, it had the effect of giving depth and emphasis to the head. – I scared off half the background and left everything in masses – one could now see past and across the head and the glass.. .I had achieved much of that first impression, the trembling mouth – the transparent skin – the tired eyes – but the picture was not finished in its colour – it was pale grey – the picture was then heavy as lead. [Munch showed the painting on the Autumn Exhibition 18 October 1886; it was criticized severely, even by his bohemian art-friend Jager]"