MK: Do you think of yourself as an abstract artist?
CG: I always hate those designations. I suppose it’s partly because I don’t think of painting that way. I think of painting as painting. I’m not denying that those things are real designations, but to choose to be one or the other feels like too much to handle. I just want to make paintings. A couple years ago I heard a lecture from the 1940’s with the artist Richard Pousette-Dart. The students were asking him what was better, representation or abstraction? And he was fighting them tooth and nail all night long about it, refusing to take a side. He said “To paint a flower is to paint a lie. To paint a painting is to paint a flower.” For me it was like DING DING DING! It changed everything. It made total sense, unlocked the door or something. I love that. It is about painting, not about any other story or any other thing you can name. So I don’t know if I’m an abstract artist. I am a painter.
From a great interview up on Painting is Dead.
images: #1 Painting is dead, #2-7 Clare Grill