Howard Finster Quotations

As for me, I'm just passin' through this planet.

I came here as a man of visions. I was sent here as a man of visions, like a second Noah. I'm not a Noah but I'm here as a second Noah. I'm here as a red light is in the street.

Well, as far as I'm concerned, I'm not here to live a normal life. I'm sent here on a mission.

When I'm building my dome in my chapel, and I had a vision - I've worked on perpetual motion and I haven't never give it up yet. I still think it could be done, perpetual motion. I had a vision of a un resist able windmill.

I never did buy things on credit, I always paid for 'em, because I can't see much difference in paying for something and just waiting a week and pay interest on it; that looks foolish to me.

My work begun to spread out. And calls to the universities begun to take me out of my garden, you know.

I had a call to the University of Miami where I'd run a revival in 1950.

You can't smear acrylics, you know, it dries too fast.

Sometimes I don't even pull my shoes off for six weeks at a time, except, you know, just to take a shower. I just take breaks between 24 hours a day, just a break now and then, it don't take me long to rest; maybe 20 to30 minutes sometime, or maybe an hour.

When I'm makin' lectures to these universities, I tell 'em I like that little building because when I run short a audience, if I can get three people in there I've got a good crowd.

Every time that we've ever fought, we fought to keep from bein' destroyed. We've never started a war.

But, when I had this feeling and started painting sacred art, as I had this feeling to do, then it come to me: my problem is I'll get a lot of criticism and another problem is my work's not good enough to sell.

You know, I been accused - people call me crazy like they did Noah, you know. Some people think I'm insane, like, maybe a percentage like insane?

And I just started a church. I called it the World's Folk Art Church. I bought this old church. There was no deacons or pastors or anything.

So all I have to do is just when that Holy Spirit says to do something, I know that's supposed to be done, regardless to anything else.

I never met someone I did not love.

I took the pieces you threw away, put them together by night and day. Washed by the rain. Dried by the sun. A million pieces all in one.

And since they wasn't able to turn my art over, I sort of just switched off to Phyllis Kind, she's really my agent. She has a gallery in Chicago.