Untitled

"May i use a simile, the simile of a tree ? The artist has studied
this world of variety and has, we may suppose, unobtruvesly found
his way in it. His sense of direction has brought order into the
passing stream of image and experience. This sens of direction in
nature and life, this branching and spreading array, i shall
compare with the root of the tree.

From the root the sap flows to the artist, flows through him,
flows to his eye.

Thus he stands as the trunk of the tree.

Battered and stirred by the strength of the flow, he moulds his
vision into his work.

As, in full view of the world, the crown of the tree unfolds and
spreads in time and space, so with his work.

Nobody would affirm that the tree grows its crown in the image of
its root. between above and below can be no mirrored reflection.
It is obvious that different functions expanding in different
elements must produce vital divergences.
...
And yet, standing at his appointed place, the trunk of the tree,
he does nothing other than gather and pass on what comes to him
from the depths.

He neither serves nor rules he transmits.

His position is humble. And the beauty at the crown is not his
own. He is merely a channel"

From "On Modern Art" Paul Klee 1924

I found this used for 7$. Invaluable.