Quotes: Sheldon Kopp

"You are free to do whatever you like. You need only face the consequences."

 –– Sheldon Kopp (1929-1999), American psychotherapist and author 

via: Commonplace Book, 2024, 2025, p. 33.

Quotes: Marcel Proust

"... In fashioning a work of art we are by no means free, we do not choose how we shall make it but ... it pre-exists us and therefore we are obliged, since it is both necessary and hidden, to do what we should have to do if it were a law of nature –– that is to say, to discover it."   

–– Marcel Proust (1871-1922), French writer and critic 

via: Commonplace Book 2006-2009, 2008, p. 152. 

Quotes: Gloria Steinem

"The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off! 

–– Gloria Steinem (b. 1934), American writer and journalist

via: Sketchbook N 14, 2024, p. 15. 

Quotes: Joel Haran

Joel and Helena [Haran] "dreamed up the idea for their first furniture collection while on holiday in Greece ("because you get the best ideas when your mind is free," Joel says)."

"That's where being perfectionist comes in – and the need to balance it with the more relaxed pace of outdoor life and the Cornish landscape. They work on one farm, live on another, and spend as much time on the beach as they can. "You need time and space," Joel says, "because when you're stressed, you can't be creative. You stick with the first idea rather than exploring other options." 

–– Joel Haran, UK designer

Source: Modern Rustic UK 06, p. 81.

via: Art Alternatives Knapsack Sketchbook J 2020-2023, 2021, p. 20-21. 

Quotes: Langston Hughes

"An artist must be free to choose what he does, certainly, but he must also never be afraid to do what he might choose."

 –– Langston Hughes (1901-1967), American writer and social activist 

Quotes: Agnes Martin

"There is no way to describe the reward of absolute obedience. Any response to art is obedience. I wish I could point out how authoritative art work is dependent on the obedient state of mind.... When we see that all the authority there is, is within ourselves as a result of our obedience then we are free."

–– Agnes Martin (1912-2004), Canadian-born American abstract painter 

via: Sketchbook 21, 2013, p. 65