William T. Wiley Quotes

Visual art is a foreign language I'm fluent at, but my native language is language.

Wherever there are words, let there be pictures.

Well, I like how people talk. I like language. You know, Linda Richman spoke in Yiddish.

A different language is a different vision of life.

That night image had replaced the written word as the natural language of politics.

I began doing writing projects and art and design projects to explore a new way of seeing Canada. Roots is one more way of continuing this exploration. I want to present a wide-open Canadian sense of color, adventure, communication and openness that defines our country.

While we cannot describe its appearance (the equivalent), we can define its function. When a photograph functions as an Equivalent we can say that at that moment, and for that person the photograph acts as a symbol or plays the role of a metaphor for something that is beyond the subject photographed.

What goes on in abstract art is the proclaiming of aesthetic principles... It is in our own time that we have become aware of pure aesthetic considerations. Art never can be imitation.

I wanted to communicate what I had seen, so that others could see it.

I speak African. I can even speak Italian.

A picture is a poem without words.

To design is to communicate clearly by whatever means you can control or master.

Of all of our inventions for mass communication, pictures still speak the most universally understood language.

The waste basket is the writer's best friend.

The way I make art - the way a lot of people make art - is as an extension of language and communication, where references are incredibly important.

So many paintings have hidden meanings or need wall texts, but my work is not in that category.

For people to understand me when I travel, I speak with my hands.

If you judge everything by how photographically real it looks, then you're missing out on a lot of what art is about and what communication is. There are ambiguities in life, and that should be reflected in art, cinema, and storytelling, I think.

If you go to Paris, try to speak French. If you go to the South, try to speak Southern. Southern isn't stupid. Southern is narrative; Southern is family.

Comics are a wonderful form. You can do so much with it.

There's many ways you communicate. With colour, texture, sound... Even words can communicate.

In my own art, I try to use my personal voice and effort to enable some Chinese people to see the possibilities of another kind of China. A more open China.

If you have something to say, a movie is a really great medium to say it. It doesn't matter what the message is.

Visual storytelling is at once immediate and subversive.

I appreciate America as being the most artistic nation because of its diversity.