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My interest in desperation lies only in that sometimes I find myself having become desperate. Very seldom do I start out that way. I can see of course that, in the abstract, thinking and all activity is rather desperate.

Willem de Kooning

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Willem de Kooning
Age: 92 †
Born: 1904
Born: April 24
Died: 1997
Died: March 19
Artist
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Willem De Kooning
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Maybe in that earlier phase I was painting the woman in me. Art isn't a wholly masculine occupation, you know.
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The idea of space is given to the artist to change if he can. The subject matter in the abstract is space.
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You have to keep on the very edge of something, all the time, or the picture dies.
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In art one idea is as good as another.
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Yes, I am influenced by everbody. But every time I put my hands in my pockets I find someone else's fingers there.
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Im not someone whos ever said anything definitive about his work. In my life also I have very little fixed form. I can change overnight.
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The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all your time.
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And then there is that one-man movement, Marcel Duchamp for me a truly modern movement because it implies that each artist can do what he thinks he ought to a movement for each person and open for everybody.
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Every so often, a painter has to destroy painting. Cezanne did it, Picasso did it with Cubism. Then Pollock did it. He busted our idea of a picture all to hell. Then there could be new paintings again.
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The drawings that interest me most are made with closed eyes. With eyes closed, I feel my hand slide down on the paper. I have an image in mind, but the results always surprise me.
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I have to change to stay the same.
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Even an abstract form has to have a likeness.
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I read somewhere that Rubens said students should not draw from life, but draw from all the great classic casts. Then you really get the measure of them, you really know what to do. And then, put in your own dimples. Isn't that marvelous!
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An artist is someone who makes art... He didn't invent it.
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I don't paint to live, I live to paint.
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Even abstract shapes must have a likeness
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Spiritually I am wherever my spirit allows me to be, and that is not necessarily in the future... Art never seems to make me peaceful or pure.
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I'd like to get all the colors in the world into one painting
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The 'Women' had to do with the female painted through all ages, all those idols, and maybe I was stuck to a certain extent I couldn't go on. It did one thing for me: it eliminated composition, arrangement, relationships, light - all this silly talk about line, colour and form - because that was the thing I wanted to get hold of.
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