Agnes Martin Quotes & Sayings

The main thing in making art often is letting go of your expectation and your idea. — Agnes Martin

I often paint tranquility. If you stop thinking and rest, then a little happiness comes into your mind. At perfect rest you are comfortable. — Agnes Martin

My paintings are certainly nonobjective. They're just horizontal lines. — Agnes Martin

The enormous pitfall is devotion to oneself instead of to life. All works that are self-devoted are absolutely ineffective. — Agnes Martin

It is commonly thought that everything that is can be put into words. — Agnes Martin

Happiness is being on the beam with life - to feel the pull of life. — Agnes Martin

It would be an endless battle if it were all up to ego
because it does not destroy and is not destroyed by itself
It is like a wave
it makes itself up, it rushes forward getting nowhere really
it crashes, withdraws and makes itself up again
pulls itself together with pride
towers with pride
rushes forward into imaginary conquest
crashes in frustration
withdraws with remorse and repentance
pulls itself together with new resolution — Agnes Martin

Beauty and happiness and life are all the same and they are pervasive, unattached and abstract and they are our only concern. They are immeasurable, completely lacking in substance. They are perfect and sublime. This is the subject matter of art. — Agnes Martin

Inspiration is there all the time. For everyone whose mind is not clouded over with thoughts whether they realize it or not. — Agnes Martin

I once taught art to adults in a night course. I had a woman who painted her back yard, and she said it was the first time she had ever really looked at it. I think everyone sees beauty. Art is a way to respond — Agnes Martin

Fulfill your potential. That's the way to happiness. — Agnes Martin

When I think of art I think of beauty. Beauty is the mystery of life. It is not in the eye it is in the mind. In our minds there is awareness of perfection. — Agnes Martin

I don't think the way to succeed is by doing something aggressive. Aggression is weak-minded. — Agnes Martin

Art is the concrete representation of our most subtle feelings. — Agnes Martin

I hope I have made it clear that the work is about perfection as we are aware of it in our minds but that the paintings are very far from being perfect - completely removed in fact - even as we ourselves are. — Agnes Martin

That which takes us by surprise-moments of happiness-that is inspiration. — Agnes Martin

When I first made a grid, I happened to be thinking of the innocence of trees, and then a grid came into my mind and I thought it represented innocence, and I still do, and so I painted it and then I was satisfied. I thought, 'This is my vision.' — Agnes Martin

It's through discipline and tremendous disappointment and failure that you arrive at what it is you must paint. — Agnes Martin

The value of art is in the observer. — Agnes Martin

What we really want to do is serve happiness. We want everyone to be happy, never unhappy even for a moment. We want the animals to be happy. The happiness of every living thing is what we want. — Agnes Martin

I don't believe in influence. I think that in order to be an artist, you have to move. When you stop moving, then you're no longer an artist. And if you move from somebody else's position, you simply cannot know the next step. I think that everyone is on his own line. I think that after you've made one step, the next step reveals itself. I believe that you were born on this line. I don't say that the actual footsteps were marked before you get to them, and I don't say that change isn't possible in your course. But I do believe we unfold out of ourselves, and we do what we are born to do sooner or later, anyway. — Agnes Martin

The worst thing you can think about when you're working is yourself. — Agnes Martin

My paintings are not about what is seen. They are about what is known forever in the mind. — Agnes Martin

It's not about facts, it's about feelings. It's about remembering feelings and happiness. A definition of art is that it makes concrete our most subtle emotions. I think the highest form of art is music. It's the most abstract of all art expression. — Agnes Martin

Pollock was terrific. I think he freed himself of all kinds of worry about this world. Ran around and dripped, and then he managed to express ecstasy. — Agnes Martin

Anything can be painted without representation. — Agnes Martin

I think everyone is born 100 percent ego, and after that it's just adjustment. — Agnes Martin

Any material may be used but the theme is the same and the response is the same for all artwork ... we all have the same concern, but the artist must know exactly what the experience is. He must pursue the truth relentlessly. — Agnes Martin

Artwork is a representation of our devotion to life. — Agnes Martin

One thing I like about Zen. It doesn't believe in achievement. — Agnes Martin

You can't make a perfect painting. We can see perfection in our minds. But we can't make a perfect painting. — Agnes Martin

There's nobody living who couldn't stand all afternoon in front of a waterfall ... Anyone who can sit on a stone in a field awhile can see my painting. Nature is like parting a curtain, you go into it ... as you would cross an empty beach to look at the ocean. — Agnes Martin

You sort of underestimate the human being when you say that every least thing that is an abstract experience is spiritual. It isn't. It's just your real self. You can be capable of fantastic abstract experiences, right in this life. — Agnes Martin

To progress in life you must give up the things you do not like. Give up doing the things that you do not like to do. You must find the things that you do like. The things that are acceptable to your mind. — Agnes Martin

People who look at my painting say that it makes them happy, like the feeling when you wake up in the morning. And happiness is the goal, isn't it? — Agnes Martin

I'm very careful not to have ideas, because they're inaccurate. — Agnes Martin

When you look in your mind you find it covered with a lot of rubbishy thoughts. You have to penetrate these and hear what your mind is telling you to do. Such work is original work. — Agnes Martin

I used to meditate until I learned to stop thinking. — Agnes Martin

Beauty is the mystery of life. It is not in the eye, it is in the mind. — Agnes Martin

Beauty is in the mind, not the eye. — Agnes Martin

I think our minds respond to things beyond this world. Take beauty: it's a very mysterious thing, isn't it? I think it's a response in our minds to perfection. It's too bad, people not realizing that their minds expand beyond this world. — Agnes Martin

Doing what you were born to do ... That's the way to be happy. — Agnes Martin

I would like my work to be recognized as being in the classical tradition (Coptic, Egyptian, Greek, Chinese), as representing the Ideal in the mind. Classical art cannot possibly be eclectic. One must see the ideal in one's own mind. It is like a memory - an awareness -of perfection. — Agnes Martin

Of all the pitfalls in our paths and the tremendous delays and wanderings off the track, I want to say that they are not what they seem to be. I want to say that all that seems like fantastic mistakes are not mistakes, all that seems like error
is not error; and it all has to be done. That which seems like a false step is the next step. — Agnes Martin

The Minimalists are idealist. They want to minimize themselves in favor of the ideal ... But I just can't. You see, my paintings are not cool. — Agnes Martin

I want to emphasize the fact that we all have the same experience and the same concern, but the artist must know exactly what the experience is. He must pursue the truth relentlessly. Once he sees this fact his feet are on the path. If you want to know the truth you will know it. The manipulation of materials in an artwork is a result of this state of mind. The artist works by awareness of his own state of mind. — Agnes Martin

I paint with my back to the world — Agnes Martin

The adventurous state of mind is a high house ... The joy of adventure is unaccountable. This is the attractiveness of artwork. It is adventurous, strenuous and joyful. — Agnes Martin

What I say is that we're capable of a transcendent response, and I think it makes us happy. And I do think beauty produces a transcendent response. — Agnes Martin