I have learned that what I have not drawn I have never really seen, and that when I start drawing an ordinary thing, I realize how extraordinary it is, sheer miracle.

In this twentieth century, to stop rushing around, to sit quietly on the grass, to switch off the world and come back to the earth, to allow the eye to see a willow, a bush, a cloud, a leaf, is an unforgettable experience.

We do a lot of looking: we look through lenses, telescopes, television tubes... Our looking is perfected every day, but we see less and less.

In the history of everyone in whom the artist-within has survived conditioning, schooling, training - there are (persons) influences that have kept him alive, awake .. who have encouraged him without even trying - just by being. They have been One's real teachers.

For you can look at things while talking or with a radio going full blast, but you can see only when the chatter stops.

It is in order to really see, to see ever deeper, ever more intensely, hence to be fully aware and alive, that I draw what the Chinese call 'The Ten Thousand Things' around me. Drawing is the discipline by which I constantly rediscover the world. I have learned that what I have not drawn, I have never really seen, and that when I start drawing an ordinary thing, I realize how extraordinary it is, sheer miracle.

The local painters were my idols...These artists, too, were grown-ups, but they were grown-ups who could still see! Their eye was still in love! Like mine!