Joan Mitchell on Mind

"Elaine Elaine de Kooning, Mercedes Matter.. .Well May Rosenberg, but she wasn't a painter. Jane Freilicher. Nell Blaine.. .Well, there were Grace and Helen , of course.. .How did I feel, like how? I felt, you know, when I was discouraged I wondered if really women couldn't paint, the way all the men said they couldn't paint. But then at other times I said, 'Fuck them,' you know. But I think the women were, some of them, more down on women than the men.. .I adulated the men so much they sort of liked me. I mean, I thought Bill was a great painter. They liked me.. .Hans Hofmann was very supportive -of me. I used to run into him in the park. I'd be dog-walking at nine in the morning, he'd say, 'Mitchell, you should be painting.' Very nice. I don't think women in any way were a threat to these men, so they could encourage the 'lady painter.'"