The artist who aims at perfection in everything achieves it in nothing.

The artist who aims at perfection in everything achieves it in nothing.

The irrepressible spirit that made his playing seem like good conversation is the Rubinstein legacy for pianists, if they can read more

The irrepressible spirit that made his playing seem like good conversation is the Rubinstein legacy for pianists, if they can pick up their heads from the keyboard long enough to claim it.

The choirs left the main tune and soared two octaves past heaven in a descant to rattle the bones and read more

The choirs left the main tune and soared two octaves past heaven in a descant to rattle the bones and surge the heart.

Feminist art is not some tiny creek running off the great river of real art. It is not some crack read more

Feminist art is not some tiny creek running off the great river of real art. It is not some crack in an otherwise flawless stone. It is, quite spectacularly I think, art which is not based on the subjugation of one half of the species. It is art which will take the great human themes --love, death, heroism, suffering, history itself --and render them fully human. It may also, though perhaps our imaginations are so mutilated now that we are incapable even of the ambition, introduce a new theme, one as great and as rich as those others --should we call it "joy"?.

You do have to be fairly selfish when you have a gift. You cannot afford to let too many outside read more

You do have to be fairly selfish when you have a gift. You cannot afford to let too many outside things get in the way.

Portraits are supposed to "look within," but in my opinion very few people have an interior significantly different from the read more

Portraits are supposed to "look within," but in my opinion very few people have an interior significantly different from the outside portrait.

Without freedom, no art; art lives only on the restraints it imposes on itself, and dies of all others.

Without freedom, no art; art lives only on the restraints it imposes on itself, and dies of all others.

No one should drive a hard bargain with an artist.

No one should drive a hard bargain with an artist.

Twentieth-century art may start with nothing, but it flourishes by virtue of its belief in itself, in the possibility of read more

Twentieth-century art may start with nothing, but it flourishes by virtue of its belief in itself, in the possibility of control over what seems essentially uncontrollable, in the coherence of the inchoate, and in its ability to create its own values.