Page 47 - Studio International - December 1967

`Should everyone have a guaranteed income, as in is not self-expression; finishing a painting is not a skill
Scandinavia ?' that can be taught.'
`Everyone has to be supported. They give terrible `Do you allow your students to paint as they wish? Do
names to it—Socialist State, Welfare State—but everyone you have them ask for help when they need assistance?'
has to eat. This is a human problem, not an artistic `Yes.'
problem.' `You have been classified as a Classicist.'
`Did you work under the WPA?' `Yes, Classicism is nothing but an aesthetic approach to
`Yes.' art. Classical art has nothing "going on". You can't say
`Were you told what to do ?' very much about it. It implies a standard, essence of art.
`I was an easel painter. We had about three weeks to do It doesn't move.... Yet it doesn't have archaic stiffness
a certain size painting, 24 by 30 in.' either. It doesn't tell a story. It just is.'
`That's terrible! What happened to the artists who take `Is the artist's experience divorced from his painting? Is
a year to complete a painting?' he to be schizophrenic?'
`Well, there's no room for that kind of painter.' `Paintings are outside of the artist. It is a value in itself,
`Sometimes one has to put a painting aside and return for its own sake. Goya couldn't go through the long
to it in order to complete it.' process of lithography and maintain "emotion". You
He began to laugh and moved to the edge of his chair, know these Action painters believe that good or bad
mimicking his response. 'Oh! I thought you meant some- experiences contribute to painting, a good love affair, a

Painting 1957
60x 80in.

one painting one canvas for one year.' He was teasing bad affair...' He was smiling. 'This never happens
and had known exactly what I meant. among professional painters. Experiences don't contri-
`I'd like to pick up something we discussed earlier. My bute to my paintings. Experiences can't be directly
students liked Mondrian immediately.' transferred. Art comes from art traditions.'
`Children like Mondrian because there is a tremendous `Can they be transferred unconsciously?'
pressure to like him.' `Well, I guess so.'
`These students were never exposed to galleries of art in `Many people see religious symbols in your paintings.'
general.... Do you mean it's because of the type of life `There is no religion in my art. No artist is religious —
they lead ?' possessed.'
`Yes. You see in our society we value primitive state- `Some people say Abstract Expressionist paintings are
ments, but primitive societies don't. Some Yale students child-like.'
were here last summer and I told them the most important `Child art is not primitive ..." Image" to me is like pictures
thing is to learn how to finish what they are doing. This in a newspaper. We are in an image-ridden environment.