“The No. 1 quote critics give me is ‘Thom, your work is irrelevant.’ Now, that’s a fascinating, fascinating comment. Yes, irrelevant to the little subculture, this microculture, of modern art. But here’s the point: My art is relevant because it’s relevant to ten million people. That makes me the most relevant artist in this culture, not the least. Because I’m relevant to real people.”

Thomas Kinkade

Thomas Kinkade vs Richard Branson vs Andy Warhol vs Basqiat vs Paul Klee vs Kanye West vs Joey Ramone… Which is the best artist? Which the most transparent and insightful and true to themselves? One day let’s get drinks and talk late into the night about it… and about the implications our answers have on how we live.

“Art derives a considerable part of its beneficial exercise from flying in the face of presumptions.”

Henry James, 1884

“One often hears of writers that rise and swell with their subject, though it may seem but an ordinary one. How, then, with me, writing of this Leviathan [Moby Dick]? Unconsciously my chirography expands into placard capitals. Give me a condor’s quill! Give me Vesuvius’ crater for an inkstand! Friends, hold my arms!”

Herman Melville

Friends, hold my arms!

“Please understand that everything everyone has done in this room — including myself — is primitive. We’re in the first moments of doing something. And we have this arrogance that we’re ‘really doing something.’ No. We’re in this rapidly changing thing and we can’t vest in the excellence or the finality of anything we’re doing.”

Richard Saul Wurman