Alice Provensen > Quotes

“In this quiet corner, the best wild flowers grow, and the first peepers are heard in the spring, even before the snow melts. Here, owls call from the treetops in the early morning, and the irreverent crows hold their noisy conventions. Here, the mother deer has her fawn, and the migrating geese come to rest. It is here that the fox is safe from the hunters.”
― Alice Provensen

“When people look at my work, they often say, “Your picture is so good. I can’t even draw a straight line.” I think everyone can learn to draw. The important thing is to keep trying, keep drawing.

[…]

Young children make marvelous pictures. There is nothing they can’t draw. They paint and draw from their imaginations and the world around them. And they are not afraid to draw anything.

I saw a child’s picture, a country landscape. It had fifteen trees that looked like lollipops, both a sun and a moon in the sky and a crazy river running through. It wasn’t very realistic, but it was a miracle of design. … And when children draw people or portraits of themselves, even if they are only stick figures, they have an animate quality that a professional rarely gets.”
― Alice Provensen

“Kids are clever and full of fun but, oh, they can be a terrible nuisance!”
― Alice Provensen, Our Animal Friends at Maple Hill Farm

“It isn’t until an adult criticizes the picture and makes derogatory comments … that children lose their confidence and stop drawing. If young people spent as much time drawing as they do learning [the] alphabet … they would all make good pictures and maybe never even need to draw a straight line.”
― Alice Provensen

“A skunk is walking by. Skunks don't hurry or hide. The dogs and cats pretend not to notice them. It is best not to.”
― Alice Provensen, Our Animal Friends at Maple Hill Farm