Quote

Working is very important to me. Probably because as a child I was taught that work was good. I don’t believe it intellectually but I identify with that idea. So it’s probably just like a habit.

Jasper Johns

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Jasper Johns
Age: 94
Born: 1930
Born: May 15
Artist
Costume Designer
Designer
Graphic Artist
Illustrator
Painter
Photographer
Printmaker
Sculptor
Augusta
Georgia
Important
Habit
Work
Taught
Believe
Probably
Good
Child
Like
Working
Idea
Ideas
Intellectually
Children
Identify

More quotes by Jasper Johns

Image
I'm not sure what 'coming out right' means. It often means that what you do holds a kind of energy that you wouldn't just put there, that comes about through grace of some sort.
Jasper Johns
Image
I feel that works of art are an opportunity for people to construct meaning, so I don't usually tell what they mean. It conveys to people that they have to participate.
Jasper Johns
Image
Merce is my favorite artist in any field.
Jasper Johns
Image
Old art offers just as good a criticism of new art as new art offers of old.
Jasper Johns
Image
I think a painting should include more experience than simply intended statement.
Jasper Johns
Image
I have meant what I have done. Or I have often meant what I have done. Or I have sometimes meant what I have done. Or I have tried to mean what I was doing.
Jasper Johns
Image
I think through living one's life, one both changes and remains the same. One can see it either way, one can see oneself as being now what one was and one can see oneself as being absolutely different from what one was. It's a trick of thought.
Jasper Johns
Image
I would tend to say that I do what I do as well as possible and that most people don't.
Jasper Johns
Image
Take an object. Do something to it. Do something else to it.
Jasper Johns
Image
That’s what painting does it organizes vision in a certain way or suggests that certain things be paid attention to and certain other things not be paid attention to. It functions in that way to a certain extent in our civilization.
Jasper Johns
Image
I am just trying to find a way to make pictures.
Jasper Johns
Image
As one gets older one sees many more paths that could be taken. Artists sense within their own work that kind of swelling of possibilities, which may seem a freedom or a confusion.
Jasper Johns
Image
There may or may not be an idea, and the meaning may just be that the painting exists.
Jasper Johns
Image
A-not-complete-unit, or a new unit. The elements in the 3 parts should neither fit nor not fit together. One would like not to be led. Avoid the idea of a puzzle which could be solved. Remove the signs of thought. It is not thought which needs showing.
Jasper Johns
Image
Art is either a complaint or appeasement.
Jasper Johns
Image
I assumed that everything would lead to complete failure, but I decided that didn't matter – that would be my life.
Jasper Johns
Image
To me, self-description is a calamity.
Jasper Johns
Image
I don't know how to organise thoughts. I don't know how to have thoughts.
Jasper Johns
Image
I'm especially interested in the music of John Cage... I would like to do some experimenting with the relationship between his freeform sound and free-form art.
Jasper Johns
Image
Put a lot of paint & a wooden ball or other object on a board. Push to the other end of the board. Use this in a painting. - ruler on board.
Jasper Johns