on motivation (bourgeois)

On “Untitled,” 1949: …It is a mechanical thing. By mechanical you mean something that works. I am interested in cars because they self-propel themselves for reasons that are reasonable and mechanical. So this is it: How am I going to be self-operating all by myself? Well, I can do that if I can invent something that keeps me going.
- 83, Louise Bourgeois: Drawings & Observations – Louise Bourgeois w/ Lawrence Rinder

on portraits and peopling the world (bourgeois)

On “Untitled,” 1946: At one point I stopped making self-portraits, and I included the people that lived with me. I would say that it had to do with the problem of the toi and the moi, of the you and the me. Life is not worth living if you talk only about the moi. Life is interesting in terms of others. To be without others, it is not worth living. To live alone—unless you are religious character—isn’t worth it.
- 53, Louise Bourgeois: Drawings & Observations – Louise Bourgeois w/ Lawrence Rinder

on beauty and bananas (bourgeois)

On “La Femme fiere d’elle meme,” 1946: She has a beautiful, fluffy dress and she has heels, high heels. If you have high heels, people will love you. If you want people to love you, you have to love yourself first. That’s what it means. (51)

On “Les Voleuses de grate ciel,” 1949: If you want to kill your rival in the eyes of a woman, you put a banana peel on the floor, so he is going to come and be very, very charming, and he will slip on the peel and be ridiculous, and the girl will laugh at him and you will have conquered the girl. (95)

- Louise Bourgeois: Drawings & Observations – Louise Bourgeois w/ Lawrence Rinder

getting out of tough situations; bourgeois

We lived in Easton, where there was no city water and we were totally dependent on the well. The water table was low in Easton, so the well was quite deep.
The guilt feeling and the severity that inhabited the house were expressed by, “You better be good or I’ll push you down the well.” You see, that was the ultimate punishment. Certainly, I didn’t push anybody into the well, but look at these here, one and two…my two sons Jean-Louis and Alain. I did something wrong and, sure enough, they pushed me in. I’m not accusing them….
The figure is screaming at the bottom of the well.
We have tunnel vision and we have bottom-of-the-well vision. If you visualize yourself down there, the question is, how are you going to get out? This philosophy is an optimistic philosophy. By hook or by crook, you are going to get yourself out. And I always did. But how? By drawing.
- Louise Bourgeois, on “Untitled,” 1947