Paintings, like poetry or music, are essential nutrients that help people sustain healthy lives. They’re not recreational pleasures or sidelines. They are tools that help us grasp the diversity of the world and its history, and explore the emotional capacities with which we navigate that world. They illuminate, they humble, they nurture, they inspire. They teach us to use our eyes and to know ourselves by knowing others. If New York’s legions of irresistible paintings could sing, these hills would be magnificently alive with the sound of their music.
— Roberta Smith, “Landscape and Still Lifes of New Territories,” New York Times December 30, 2010. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/31/arts/design/31smith.html?ref=design
