Lara Jensen

Art comes from self-delusion. If you don’t believe, then how can you convince others? Don’t try to be great, just be good. Any clown can hit one out of the park once in a while, but it’s much harder to be good consistently.

If you’re afraid to go just that bit little farther and fuck the whole thing up, then you’re in trouble. You’re painting with one hand tied behind your back. My old teacher, the British painter Michael Tyzack, used to say, “Without risk, there can be no serious painting.”

“I began to talk. I talked about summer, and about time. The pleasures of eating, the terrors of the night. About this cup we call a life. About happiness. And how good it feels, the heat of the sun between the shoulder blades.”

— Mary Oliver, from New And Selected Poems, Volume Two

“Love the animals, love the plants, love everything. If you love everything, you will perceive the divine mystery in things. Once you have perceived it, you will begin to comprehend it better every day, and you will come at last to love the world with an all-embracing love.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov