Quote

I'd rather risk an ugly surprise than rely on things I know I can do.

Helen Frankenthaler

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Helen Frankenthaler
Age: 83 †
Born: 1928
Born: December 12
Died: 2011
Died: December 27
Designer
Lithographer
Painter
Printmaker
Watercolorist
New York City
New York
H. Frankenthaler
Mrs. Robert Burns Motherwell
Rather
Things
Rely
Ugly
Surprise
Risk

More quotes by Helen Frankenthaler

Image
I don't resent being a female painter. I don't exploit it. I paint.
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
A really good picture looks as if it's happened at once. It's an immediate image.
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
The price for living the life I have -- for any serious, devoted person, is that at times one must live alone, or feel alone. I think loneliness is associated in many people's minds when they think about success.
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
In relations with people, as in art, if you always stick to style, manners, and what will work, and you're never caught off guard, then some beautiful experiences never happen.
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
Every canvas is a journey all its own.
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
There are no rules. Let the picture lead you where it must go.
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
One really beautiful wrist motion, that is synchronized with your head and heart, and you have it. It looks as if it were born in a minute.
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
I wanted things that I couldn't at times articulate.
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
I had the landscape in my arms as I painted it. I had the landscape in my mind and shoulder and wrist.
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
You have to know how to use the accident, how to recognise it, how to control it, and ways to eliminate it so that the whole surface looks felt and born all at once.
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
I have always been concerned with painting that simultaneously insists on a flat surface and then denies it.
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
The question of sex will take care of itself.
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
What concerns me when I work, is not whether the picture is a landscape, or whether it's pastoral, or whether somebody will see a sunset in it. What concerns me is - did I make a beautiful picture?
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
We would sift through every inch of what it was that worked, or if it didn't, and wonder what was effective in it, in terms of paint, the subject matter, the size, the drawing.
Helen Frankenthaler
Image
There are no rules. That is how art is born, how breakthroughs happen. Go against the rules or ignore the rules. That is what invention is about.
Helen Frankenthaler