The narrative oftentimes is that everything that comes out of the hood is ‘real,’ and so I thought, ‘I’ll base it on the absurd, the not real. I’ll twist the idea of real on its head and see if I can get away with it. I’ll make paintings that come not from a place but through an abstract gaze.’ Mark Bradford Read Quote
I have always been interested in people who live outside of the fabric of the norm. Mark Bradford Read Quote
I look at art as a container. You can’t get inside it, so you have to ask all of these questions. Mark Bradford Read Quote
I don’t look at things in black and white. There are big gray areas. There’s a lot of slippage. Mark Bradford Read Quote
I have always been very intrigued by the outside of buildings. I can just walk down the street and be content with watching facades. I don’t have to go inside. Mark Bradford Read Quote
I just follow the things I’m interested in. That’s always guided me. If I’m interested in something, that’s where I go. Mark Bradford Read Quote
The police pull up in back of my car and run my plates – they don’t see you as you are; they see you through a racialized negative gaze. I think the best thing is not to internalize it too much, or it’ll make you crazy because you know it’s going to happen again. Mark Bradford Read Quote
At the end of the day, I’m an artist. I may make work and decide to do something political, but it will come out of an artist’s position. It won’t come out of society telling me I have to. If I do, it’s because I choose, as an artist, to do it. Mark Bradford Read Quote
The freeways create economic and racial borders in Los Angeles. South of Interstate 10 is one group of people, west of the 10 another, and south of the 405 North yet another. Mark Bradford Read Quote
I don’t know why so many artists talk about the mainstream’s problems from the fringe. I think, unfortunately, it’s almost like our education makes us too safe and terrified to step into the world. Mark Bradford Read Quote
