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" You know, the way art history is taught, often there's nothing that tells you why the painting is great. The description of a lousy painting and the description of a great painting will very much sound the same. "

Chuck Close

Know

Art

Great

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" I think most paintings are a record of the decisions that the artist made. I just perhaps make them a little clearer than some people have. "

" I did some pastels and I did other pieces in which there was just basically one color per square, and then they would get bigger and I could get 2 or 3 colors into the square, and ultimately I just started making oil paintings. "

" I think I was driven to paint portraits to commit images of friends and family to memory. I have face blindness, and once a face is flattened out, I can remember it better. "

" I discovered about 150 dots is the minimum number of dots to make a specific recognizable person. You can make something that looks like a head, with fewer dots, but you won't be able to give much information about who it is. "

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" Every child should have a chance to feel special. "

" There are so many artists that are dyslexic or learning disabled, it's just phenomenal. There's also an unbelievably high proportion of artists who are left-handed, and a high correlation between left-handedness and learning disabilities. "

" I'm plagued with indecision in my life. I can't figure out what to order in a restaurant. "

" You don't have to have a great art idea - just get to work and something will happen. So that's pretty much my modus operandi and pretty much my principal position, such as it is. "

" Neurologically, I'm a quadriplegic, so virtually everything about my work has been driven by my learning disabilities, which are quite severe, and my lack of facial recognition, which I'm sure is what drove me to paint portraits in the first place. "

Chuck Close

Work

Recognition

" I knew from the age of five what I wanted to do. The one thing I could do was draw. I couldn't draw that much better than some of the other kids, but I cared more and I wanted it badly. "

Chuck Close

Age

One Thing

" Painting is the frozen evidence of a performance. "

" Most people are good at too many things. And when you say someone is focused, more often than not what you actually mean is they're very narrow. "

" Sculpture occupies real space like we do... you walk around it and relate to it almost as another person or another object. "

" I don't work with inspiration. Inspiration is for amateurs. I just get to work. "

" Painting is the most magical of mediums. The transcendence is truly amazing to me every time I go to a museum and I see how somebody figured another way to rub colored dirt on a flat surface and make space where there is no space or make you think of a life experience. "

Chuck Close

Life

Experience

" What difference does it make whether you're looking at a photograph or looking at a still life in front of you? You still have to look. "

" Inspiration is highly overrated. If you sit around and wait for the clouds to part, it's not liable to ever happen. More often than not, work is salvation. "

" Part of the joy of looking at art is getting in sync in some ways with the decision-making process that the artist used and the record that's embedded in the work. "