Sara Genn quotes:

Having a favorite color is like having a favorite lung.

Making strides in areas unencumbered by hard-won expectation feels effervescent. By switching into child-mode, shuffling the cortex, we remember our innocence, when we knew less. These are the essentials of continued aesthetic discovery.

Value choices are intuitive... It's fun to see how much you can get without leaning on contrast.

Vibrancy is only as effective as the mastering of restraint.

Art is a perfectly complete cause.

Could rivalry be a productive system?

In modern times we are often encouraged to protect our ego-force and individuality by securing a private world in which to develop our unique artistic voice. Many artists find themselves solo-paddling along a private and unchallenging river... Could rivalry be a productive system?

Every task is given equal importance - that way I can pick and choose my tasks based on the ebb and flow of my creative metabolism.

The 'wandering studio' gathers and stores experiences, takes chances with the unfamiliar and requires a measure of self-trust. Mistakes are part of the change of scene.

Artists and their subjects are the star-crossed lovers of the world. They recognize each other on impact.

Artists live in an imperfect world where affairs of the heart must sometimes be compromised with business.

Art is sometimes likened to a mirror... an expression of universal human truth, executed with a degree of skill.

Going beyond one's backyard grants one perspective.

If an artist comes intuitively from the point of design, notan - lightness/darkness - is natural.

Joy is my energy and energy is my powerhouse.

New surroundings have a way of returning attention to areas that may have become rote.

A millionaire is a person who is free, who does what she loves, who has unlimited materials, her choice of tools, abundance, inspiration, freedom and an inflated sense of entitlement to have, create and get more.

Art begins when an observer's sensibilities engage with the understatements of a calculating craftsman.

As a community of artists, we might just keep safe each other's love affair.

As artists, we bear the charge of signalling, guiding, communicating and inspiriting change.

Be artistic, choose taste, set an example.

Does an artist truly need to understand her times in order to create? I'm not sure. We're all sitting in a context. It's a market.

Half of the pleasure of painting and feeling the joy of the creative act is sharing it with others and the feeling of connection. It could just be the colour. But it is something that someone other than you has seen and felt. It is momentous. It is magic.

Having a favourite colour is like having a favourite lung.

I can hide as much as I want in my colours

I value the momentum of making the list and the drive to tick. Sometimes I add stuff I've already accomplished so I can get going on my feelings of accomplishment.

Ideas bubble differently when we're forced to inquire about the obvious.

I'll put into words my experience as it is unfolding now in my life... in such a way that I might find comfort in knowing that someone else has the same thoughts and experiences.

In the art game we do our own cooking.

Learn from the greats, and expose yourself to better work.

Learning a new thing is a shortcut to joy and informs your area of mastery.

Make a searching and fearless inventory of your creative curiosity.

Once you sophisticate the in-betweens, your blacks and whites can take their solos and shine.

Painters tend to ignore the challenges and thrills that sculptors enjoy daily - volume... like the perfect, imperfect voluminous oval of the egg.

Pay no attention to the less courageous.

Play is your route to mastery.

Read in order to write, but paint in order to paint.

Refreshing failures roll off the travel easel like ants from a picnic blanket.

Remember the importance of phrases... a piece of something, an entry, a moment, a mark. This adjusts the pressure of the giant task of creating the perfect masterwork.

Rules are, like an ashtray-in-progress, meant to be thrown, poked and reshaped to suit yourself.

Scientists tracking mirror neurons noticed that a monkey will get excited not just when holding a banana, but also when seeing someone else holding a banana.

Some artists approach their 'why?' intuitively, and work toward giving it a voice through their technical skill. Others begin as technicians, and develop, or discover, their 'why?' as they become stronger communicators.

Stretch your goals... In other words, think big and think far off.

Study the processes and methods of those who are better at it than you... there's someone who knows something you don't, who has honed a skill more than you have. Rival your rival.

Tear-stained flops are necessary. They're the gift you give yourself when you're willing to fly.

The Painter's Keys is a timeless, universal guide to lifemanship masquerading as a painting blog.

The strategy of keeping the studio close, like an outbuilding five paces from the house, or in the loft next door, or with the studio on one end and the bed on the other - makes art always available.

There's a saying that goes, 'The universe gives you a whisper, then a nudge, then a push and then an anvil on your head.

These days, if you happen to be a poet you have to sing your words to get your ideas out.

Things we do regularly become buried with habits, and we lose the ability to extract their powers to inspire.

To return to awareness is to notice this new world with baby-eyes, and to appreciate her strangeness.

Why all these years have I been agreeably turning down the stereo every time the phone rings?

Why can't we all just acknowledge that 'nature' - that is, 'sex' or 'erotic' images, which are really just 'attracters' are everywhere. Of course a flower looks like what it looks like - that's what it is - to a bee.

You are responsible for radicalizing your strengths.

You are responsible for understanding your limitations.

You are solely responsible for doing the work required to become better.

You need to paint with enough assurance and confidence to know you can do whatever you like.