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Top 30 Philip Guston Quotes (2025 Update)

Philip Guston Quote: “Frustration is one of the great things in art. Satisfaction is nothing.”

1. “Frustration is one of the great things in art. Satisfaction is nothing.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “To paint is a possessing rather than a picturing.”

2. “To paint is a possessing rather than a picturing.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “Painting is an illusion, a piece of magic, so what you see is not what you see.”

3. “Painting is an illusion, a piece of magic, so what you see is not what you see.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “There’s some mysterious process at work here, which I don’t even want to understand.”

4. “There’s some mysterious process at work here, which I don’t even want to understand.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “I should like to paint like an man who has never seen a painting, but this man -myself – lives in a museum.”

5. “I should like to paint like an man who has never seen a painting, but this man -myself – lives in a museum.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “I go to the studio everyday because one day I may go and the Angel will be there. What if I don’t go and the Angel comes?”

6. “I go to the studio everyday because one day I may go and the Angel will be there. What if I don’t go and the Angel comes?”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “The canvas is a court where the artist is prosecutor, defendant, jury and judge. Art without a trial disappears at a glance.”

7. “The canvas is a court where the artist is prosecutor, defendant, jury and judge. Art without a trial disappears at a glance.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “There are so many things in the world – in the cities – so much to see. Does art need to represent this variety and contribute to its proliferation? Can art be that free? The difficulties begin when you understand what it is that the soul will not permit the hand to make.”

8. “There are so many things in the world – in the cities – so much to see. Does art need to represent this variety and contribute to its proliferation? Can art be that free? The difficulties begin when you understand what it is that the soul will not permit the hand to make.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “It is the bareness of drawing that I like. The act of drawing is what locates, suggests, discovers. At times it seems enough to draw, without the distractions of color and mass. Yet it is an old ambition to make drawing and painting one.”

9. “It is the bareness of drawing that I like. The act of drawing is what locates, suggests, discovers. At times it seems enough to draw, without the distractions of color and mass. Yet it is an old ambition to make drawing and painting one.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “The painting is not on a surface, but on a plane which is imagined. It moves in a mind. It is not there physically at all. It is an illusion, a piece of magic, so that what you see is not what you see.”

10. “The painting is not on a surface, but on a plane which is imagined. It moves in a mind. It is not there physically at all. It is an illusion, a piece of magic, so that what you see is not what you see.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “To will a new form is unacceptable, because will builds distortion. Desire, too, is incomplete and arbitrary. These strategies, however intimate they might become, must especially be removed to clear the way for something else...”

11. “To will a new form is unacceptable, because will builds distortion. Desire, too, is incomplete and arbitrary. These strategies, however intimate they might become, must especially be removed to clear the way for something else...”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “Painting seems like some kind of peculiar miracle that I need to have again and again.”

12. “Painting seems like some kind of peculiar miracle that I need to have again and again.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “Look at any inspired painting. It’s like a gong sounding; it puts you in a state of reverberation.”

13. “Look at any inspired painting. It’s like a gong sounding; it puts you in a state of reverberation.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “What is seen and called the picture is what remains – an evidence. Even as one travels in painting toward a state of ‘unfreedom’ where only certain things can happen, unaccountably the unknown and free must appear.”

14. “What is seen and called the picture is what remains – an evidence. Even as one travels in painting toward a state of ‘unfreedom’ where only certain things can happen, unaccountably the unknown and free must appear.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “In my experience a painting is not made with colors and paint at all. I don’t know what a painting is; who knows what sets off even the desire to paint?”

15. “In my experience a painting is not made with colors and paint at all. I don’t know what a painting is; who knows what sets off even the desire to paint?”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “I do not see why the loss of faith in the known image and symbol in our time should be celebrated as a freedom. It is a loss from which we suffer, and this pathos motivates modern painting and poetry at its heart.”

16. “I do not see why the loss of faith in the known image and symbol in our time should be celebrated as a freedom. It is a loss from which we suffer, and this pathos motivates modern painting and poetry at its heart.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “When I see people making ‘abstract’ painting, I think it’s just a dialogue and a dialogue isn’t enough. That is to say, there is you painting and this canvas. I think there has to be a third thing; it has to be a trialogue.”

17. “When I see people making ‘abstract’ painting, I think it’s just a dialogue and a dialogue isn’t enough. That is to say, there is you painting and this canvas. I think there has to be a third thing; it has to be a trialogue.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “Painting seems like impossibility, with only a sign now and then of its own light.”

18. “Painting seems like impossibility, with only a sign now and then of its own light.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “Probably the most potent desire for a painter, an image-maker, is to see it. To see what the mind can think and imagine, to realize it for oneself, through oneself, as concretely as possible.”

19. “Probably the most potent desire for a painter, an image-maker, is to see it. To see what the mind can think and imagine, to realize it for oneself, through oneself, as concretely as possible.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “More than a process, painting is being possessed...”

20. “More than a process, painting is being possessed...”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “To paint is always to start at the beginning again, yet being unable to avoid the familiar arguments about what you see yourself painting.”

21. “To paint is always to start at the beginning again, yet being unable to avoid the familiar arguments about what you see yourself painting.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “I’m not interested in painting; I’m not interested in making a picture. Then what the hell am I interested in? I must be interested in this process.”

22. “I’m not interested in painting; I’m not interested in making a picture. Then what the hell am I interested in? I must be interested in this process.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “Do I really believe that? I make a mark, a few strokes, I argue with myself, not do I like or not, but is it true or not? Is that what I mean, is that what I want?”

23. “Do I really believe that? I make a mark, a few strokes, I argue with myself, not do I like or not, but is it true or not? Is that what I mean, is that what I want?”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “If the artist starts evaluating himself, it’s an enormous block, isn’t it?”

24. “If the artist starts evaluating himself, it’s an enormous block, isn’t it?”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “I am a night painter, so when I come into the studio the next morning the delirium is over.”

25. “I am a night painter, so when I come into the studio the next morning the delirium is over.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “Painting and sculpture are very archaic forms. It’s the only thing left in our industrial society where an individual alone can make something with not just his own hands, but brains, imagination, heart maybe.”

26. “Painting and sculpture are very archaic forms. It’s the only thing left in our industrial society where an individual alone can make something with not just his own hands, but brains, imagination, heart maybe.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “It is possible to make a living thing, not a diagram of what I have been thinking: to posit with paint something living, something that changes each day.”

27. “It is possible to make a living thing, not a diagram of what I have been thinking: to posit with paint something living, something that changes each day.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “Usually I am on a work for a long stretch, until a moment arrives when the air of the arbitrary vanishes, and the paint falls into positions that feel destined.”

28. “Usually I am on a work for a long stretch, until a moment arrives when the air of the arbitrary vanishes, and the paint falls into positions that feel destined.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “I feel more as if I’m shaping something with my hands. I feel as if I’ve always wanted to get to that state. Like a blind man in a dark room had some clay, what would he make? I end up with 2 or 3 forms on a canvas, but it gets very physical for me.”

29. “I feel more as if I’m shaping something with my hands. I feel as if I’ve always wanted to get to that state. Like a blind man in a dark room had some clay, what would he make? I end up with 2 or 3 forms on a canvas, but it gets very physical for me.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “Many works of the past complete what they announce they are going to do, to our increasing boredom. Certain others plague me because I cannot follow their intentions. I can tell at a glance what Fabritius is doing, but I am spending my life trying to find out what Rembrandt was up to.”

30. “Many works of the past complete what they announce they are going to do, to our increasing boredom. Certain others plague me because I cannot follow their intentions. I can tell at a glance what Fabritius is doing, but I am spending my life trying to find out what Rembrandt was up to.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “All these troubles revolve around the irritable mutual dependence of life and art – with their need and contempt for one another. Of necessity, to create is a temporary state and cannot be possessed...”

31. “All these troubles revolve around the irritable mutual dependence of life and art – with their need and contempt for one another. Of necessity, to create is a temporary state and cannot be possessed...”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “That’s what I mean by something grips in a canvas. The moment that happens you are then sucked into the whole thing. Like some kind of rhythm.”

32. “That’s what I mean by something grips in a canvas. The moment that happens you are then sucked into the whole thing. Like some kind of rhythm.”

— Philip Guston

Philip Guston Quote: “The canvas you are working on modifies the previous ones in an unending, baffling chain which never seems to finish. What sympathy is demanded of the viewer? He is asked to ‘see’ the future links.”

33. “The canvas you are working on modifies the previous ones in an unending, baffling chain which never seems to finish. What sympathy is demanded of the viewer? He is asked to ‘see’ the future links.”

— Philip Guston

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