Wayne Thiebaud Quotes

Commonplace objects are constantly changing… The pies, for example, we now see, are not going to be around forever. We are merely used to the idea that things do not change.

My subject matter was a genuine sort of experience that came out of my life, particularly the American world in which I was privileged to be . . . . I would really think of the bakery counters, of the way the counter was lit, where the pies were placed, but I wanted just a piece of the experience. From when I worked in restaurants . . . [it was] always poetic to me.

A conscious decision to eliminate certain details and include selective bits of personal experiences or perceptual nuances, gives the painting more of a multi-dimension than when it is done directly as a visual recording. This results in a kind of abstraction... and thus avoids the pitfalls of mere decoration.

Common objects become strangely uncommon when removed from their context and ordinary ways of being seen.

I haven't the slightest idea what art is, but to be a painter is something of which you have to prove.

My sin as a painter is that I just want to paint anything I want to paint - and repaint.

If we don't have a sense of humor, we lack a sense of perspective

Every paint-stroke takes you farther and farther away from your initial concept. And you have to be thankful for that.

Art means something very rare, an extraordinary achievement.

An artist has to train his responses more than other people do. He has to be as disciplined as a mathematician. Discipline is not a restriction but an aid to freedom. It prepares an artist to choose his own limitations.

The Gold Rush and the Pony Express made Sacramento a substantial place in terms of enterprise.

Art is not delivered like the morning paper; it has to be stolen from Mount Olympus.

Discipline is not a restriction but an aid to freedom.