43 Quotes by Wayne Thiebaud

Art means something very rare, an extraordinary achievement.

When you think of painting as painting it is rather absurd. The real world is before us - glorious sunlight and activity and fresh air, and high speed motor cars and television, all the animation - a world apart from a little square of canvas that you smear paint on.

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.

I'm not just interested in the pictorial aspects of the landscape - see a pretty place and try to paint it - but in some way to manage it, manipulate it, or see what I can turn it into.

Painting is more important than art.

I think of myself as a beginner. Sometimes that's the whole joy. If you could just do it, there'd be no point in doing it.

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

Discipline is not a restriction but an aid to freedom.