Top 17 Quotes & Sayings by Peter Saul

Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American artist Peter Saul.
Last updated on November 21, 2024.
Peter Saul

Peter Saul is an American painter. His work has connections with Pop Art, Surrealism, and Expressionism. His early use of pop culture cartoon references in the late 1950s and very early 1960s situates him as one of the fathers of the Pop Art movement. He realised about 800 paintings during his career.

You never know about the art world because it's a matter of opinion. If you look at old art like Rembrandt and Vermeer, it's not completely a matter of opinion. The pictures confront you, and you see exactly what it is. In modern art, a lot of it is suggestive, and it becomes a matter of opinion.
I like it best when two ideas collide, like when you have a crazed attitude towards women combined with a crazed attitude towards the Vietnamese. I like that. Even if it's not true, I don't care whether it's true or false. I just do it.
A mistake I've made is I have not worried sufficiently about the art world, really. I have not concerned myself with the other people in the art world. I've been a little too singular, and that's a mistake I've made. But everybody makes a mistake of some kind, and if that's my only mistake, I'm happy.
When I was growing up, nothing unpleasant was shown in the home. And when I was in art school, the only art that was presented to me was Abstract Expressionism. But I was interested in the grim stuff. It seemed more exciting.
I try to vote as left as I can. I hope that my paintings will coincide and be far left, but frequently... the painting rebels and goes fascist on me. — © Peter Saul
I try to vote as left as I can. I hope that my paintings will coincide and be far left, but frequently... the painting rebels and goes fascist on me.
While in college, I used to get my ideas from photographs in 'National Geographic.' I started painting palm trees and motorboats.
I know it's a bit of an awful thing to say, but I really just make things up. My main goal is to make a picture that people find interesting to look at and that has my name on it.
I like to see things. I see a lot more art than I'd like to see. We have to be polite and see the art shows of people we know. We see a lot of art.
I'm into using acrylic, in a complicated kind of way: Making it just as good as oil paint - better, maybe. It's odd - when I started out, acrylic was for children, pretty much. It was a cheaper paint. It wasn't supposed to look very good or last very long.
There's a small group of people always watching me to make sure I'm still offending.
Unfortunately, I haven't thought sufficiently about art. What I never realized - and it's really stupid - is the art world is the art world because all these thousands of famous and not-famous artists do things, over centuries. This hadn't occurred to me.
I celebrated success in the art world, which was quite sudden, and I suddenly had $1,000 a month, when formerly I had nothing, basically. So what we did with this money: we had a baby, we bought a car, and we celebrated by going to Rome, because it would be warmer and better looking.
I enjoy finding a low subject and bringing it up high. I think with strong technique, you can glamorize certain things. You can make the imagery sharper, rounder, and basically better looking.
A lot of the things I do are obvious things that for some reason are not done. I could never figure this out. Why don't people do the obvious?
I try to find a subject that is interesting to me and to the viewer both. If I can't, then I stop right there.
I'm aware of other artists, but what I'm really most interested in is viewing individual pictures. I like dramatic pictures.
The Pop art I wound up doing came to me purely from 'Mad' comics. I loved the idea of doing fun stuff. I met an art dealer who wanted to show the work - that was in January 1962 - and that was the beginning for me.
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