A Quote by Edgar Degas

If I were in the government I would have a brigade of policemen assigned to keeping an eye on people who paint landscapes outdoors. Oh, I wouldn't want anyone killed. I'd be satisfied with just a little buckshot to begin with.
If I were a painter, I would paint beautiful bodies - I would paint nipples, and I would paint Bibles. Am I going to say, 'I'm not going to paint this woman's neck because people will think I just want to lick on necks?' Please! That's not what art is about.
Journalists were killed because they defended freedom. Policemen were killed because they were protecting you. Jews were killed because they were Jewish.
In the sixties, for anybody to suggest that the government didn't have our best interests at heart and policemen sometimes killed people would have automatically made them a radical firebrand lefty. That's not the case anymore.
Painters paint outdoors, or in rooms full of people; they paint their lovers, alone, naked; they paint and eat; they paint and listen to the radio. It is a soothing way of doing your job.
I like the idea that you can paint something outdoors, and anyone can see it. It's open to anyone, and people have to deal with it. In the gallery, it's the same 150 people on the San Francisco art scene. There's a dynamic on the street that's definitely more interesting.
In the Army of the Shenandoah, you were the 'First Brigade!' In the Army of the Potomac you were the 'First Brigade!' In the Second Corps of this Army, you are the 'First Brigade!' You are the 'First Brigade' in the affections of your general, and I hope by your future deeds and bearing you will be handed down the posterity as the 'First Brigade' in this our Second War of Independence. Farewell!
Who says I'm not Superman?" You were looking at me with one eye closed against the sun. I shrugged "You would have recued me by now if you were Superman." I said quietly. "Who says I haven't? " Anyone would say you haven't. Anyone's just looking at it wrong then." You pushed yourself up a little, onto your elbows."Anyways, I can't steal you and rescue you. That would give me multiple personalities." And you don't have them already?
We can't discount how scary and shaken not just the Turkish government is, but Turkish society is. Imagine if you had some rump group of military officials here in the United States who started flying off with F-16s or other artillery and were taking shots at government buildings, and people were killed and injured. People would be scared and rightfully so.
So the recordings were these immersive landscapes, and yet, unlike the performances that almost no one would see, I had a sense that these could live forever. I was just starting to get my head around the democratic aspect of art; I didn't want to make rarefied things that were either alienatingly obscure or elite and art-worldy, so a recording that anyone could buy was a great medium.
You know, if government were a product, selling it would be illegal. Government is a health hazard. Governments have killed many more people than cigarettes or unbuckled seat belts ever have.
You say, 'If I had a little more, I should be very satisfied.' You make a mistake. If you are not content with what you have, you would not be satisfied if it were doubled.
Now many things are beginning to come out and it was truly a reality to me when I went to Africa, to Guinea. The little things that had been taught to me about the African people, that they were "heathens," "savages," and they were just downright stupid people. But when I got to Guinea, we were greeted by the Government of Guinea, which is Black People - and we stayed at a place that was the government building, because we were the guests of the Government.
I used to paint landscapes without any people in them but now I paint people who happen to be in a particular place. They might be outside a pub, or on a beach or in a studio. They might have clothes on or they might not.
I don't think anyone thought showbiz people know anything. I would suggest interview subjects, were told they weren't such great ideas, and then they would be assigned to somebody else. I wasn't given anything to do. I felt like the highest-paid dress extra in the world.
It never occurred to me that anyone would name a nuclear missile "Peacekeeper". It never occurred to me that thousands of people would be killed in the name of "peace-keeping".
I said, I don't want to paint things like Picasso's women and Matisse's odalisques lying on couches with pillows. I don't want to paint people. I want to paint something I have never seen before. I don't want to make what I'm looking at. I want the fragments.
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