Category Archives: Quotations

Things people said.

‘Modest, Solitary Buildings Were Often Her Subject Matter’: Gretchen Dow Simpson (1939-2025)

Posted on May 10, 2025 by JMN

While modest, solitary buildings were often her subject matter, Ms. Simpson’s work was not purely representational. A former commercial photographer, she applied a telephoto approach to many of her paintings, zooming in on windows, doorways or rooftops to emphasize the … Continue reading →

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Pippa Garner (1942-2024): Setting an Example

Posted on May 10, 2025 by JMN

“I tried to set an example that nobody else can follow.” (Pippa Garner) A one-off slogan printed on her T-shirt series called “Shirtstorm” was “These Are My Remains.” (Will Heinrich, “Pippa Garner, Conceptual Artist With a Satirical Streak, Dies at … Continue reading →

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The Few. The Proud. The Marooned

Posted on April 27, 2025 by JMN

I do solitary battle with poetry. Yes, battle. I challenge the poem, it challenges me. Me and the poem, the two of us in mental combat. From the former Gulf of MexicoTo the shores of Zuiderzee,I have pondered verses bad … Continue reading →

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‘The Choice to Limit Our Exposure to the Virtual’

Posted on April 24, 2025 by JMN

“But how much survives will depend on our own deliberate choices — the choice to date and love and marry and procreate, the choice to fight for particular nations and traditions and art forms and worldviews, the choice to limit … Continue reading →

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‘I’m Sorry, I Only Do My Own Ideas’

Posted on April 17, 2025 by JMN

The larger, more established studios, he later recalled, did not take to his eccentric work, responding with blank stares and, in one instance, suggesting religious counseling. My title is illustrator Brad Holland’s comment in turning down an assignment offered by … Continue reading →

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Did Someone Mention Drugstore Cowboys?

Posted on March 20, 2025 by JMN

The Lone Ranger rides again! That was my first take on the photo. Then it stirred my childish you-haven’t-earned-your-Stetson attitude. I was sure the article would nudge me toward curdled cowboy hat bête noire-ism. But wait: As he cavorted across the … Continue reading →

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The ‘Color(ed) Theory’ of Artist Amanda Williams

Posted on March 17, 2025 by JMN

“There is something anthropomorphic about this work… I didn’t force it. That’s what made it powerful.” (Amanda Williams) In her studio, Williams experimented with her Prussian blue, layering, diluting and pouring the paint, letting it crack, pool and bleed across … Continue reading →

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Landscapes with High Horizon Lines, Shot Through with Blood and Shrapnel

Posted on March 9, 2025 by JMN

His layers of paint, a mudlike impasto, oil and acrylic paints mixed with raw materials like soil, iron, straw and dead leaves, form deep furrows on the canvas. These landscapes, with van Gogh’s high horizon lines, all seem to be … Continue reading →

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There’ll Always Be an England: For Exquisitely Nuanced Class Distinctions

Posted on February 7, 2025 by JMN

“She went to girls’ schools and was taught French, and history, and geography, and music, and painting, the usual things that a… middle class? You might say middle class. She was really more of the sort of upper yeoman peasant … Continue reading →

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How Disparate Writings Intertwine

Posted on January 27, 2025 by JMN

“Over the past eight years, I have been tested and challenged more than any president in our 250-year history.” (Donald Trump, from Second Inaugural Address) Mr. Trump dictates revelation for his irrupting dispensation. There are impromptu connections one makes in … Continue reading →

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