Russell Banks Quotes

I began painting well before I started doing comedy. In fact, when I came out of the war in 1946, I enrolled in art school in Dayton, Ohio. I painted for three years, and then show business took hold.

I think - for a period of time, I did think art was there to serve me, but it took me a minute to reset.

I knew my focus was going to be somewhere in the arts. I've always painted. I've always sung. I didn't know when or how it was going to happen - or what it was going to be.

I think I would've found myself in the arts somewhere along the lines. If you're creative, you find something, eventually.

I want to keep - this seems so corny - I want to keep growing as an artist.

I was always artistic - right from childhood - but my love of painting came a bit later. It followed my love of music.

In middle school, I started to draw, and my pencil sketches were huge. They were these 4ft by 3ft drawings, and I got a lot of attention for that, so that was very validating. But I didn't start cartooning until I was in college.

I knew I wanted to be an artist at age 5 or 6. I always drew. At 8, I was permitted to study.

I went to art school actually when I was sixteen years old.

I hope to actually get back to painting someday... soon. I sort of transitioned into cartooning from painting.

When I was a young artist, and I would go look at other artists' career retrospectives, and I was often disappointed with the lack of story line... What was missing to me was the story of where the artist came from and how they got to where they were.

I didn't start to be an artist myself until I was 24.

I never could have predicted that I would have done something that could be called portraiture.

I really want to continue doing art. I would love to go back to doing paintings one day.

Yeah, I put out some goofy stuff. I had no idea who I was as an artist at all before 'Posse on Broadway.'

When I was really young, I was convinced I wanted to be a visual artist. I would paint and draw and make crafts.

I explored the arts in general; I took painting classes and sketching classes and acting classes and all sorts of different things.

As an artist, I want to explore as much as I can.

Actually, I didn't study photography at first. I went to school for painting my first year, poetry my second year, graphic design my third and fourth year, and photography my fifth.

I don't want to compare myself to Picasso, but he had four or five periods in his life. Any good artist grows and changes and matures.

My sister-in-law is a painter, and I'll say, how long did it take you to paint that painting. She'll say, It took me maybe three days, but it took me all my life to get the skills to paint that painting.

In life we try to grow and better ourselves. As an artist, I feel like I've grown tremendously.

I was doing illustration work, and the cartooning slowly took over.

Every artist makes himself born. It is very much harder than the other time, and longer.

I have always enjoyed drawing and painting but I don't always find the time to do much these days.