If I had not become a painter,
I would surely have become a clown..
.. because I make people laugh..
..Faces deformed
by suffering, humour or work.
Often crazy. They then became imaginary,
when I adorned them with movements
free colours depending on the head. The
colour too become clown-like

for the clown himself imitated the serious characters

A comedian goes out and hits people right on. A clown uses pathos. He can be funny, then turn right around and reach people and touch them with what life is like.

I'm a rodeo clown. It takes great skill.

I'm a clown with brush and color.

The hardest part of being a clown, it seems to me, would be that you are constantly referred to as a clown. [...] How do you even know that you want to be a clown? I guess you just get to a point where your pants look so bad it's actually easier to become a clown than to have the proper alterations done.

Some people are only funny when they try to be serious.

I always believe that funny is serious and serious is funny. You don’t really need a distinction between them. If I’m doing something on stage and it evokes an emotion, then I might show that emotion, but I also don’t believe in being a preacher. If you have a point, that’s a bonus. But the funny has to come first, otherwise you shouldn’t call yourself a comedian.

When a cartoonist attempts to be ‘fair and balanced’ and ‘understand all sides,’ they have failed. Too many avoid that altogether and instead become comedians. They take any topic and cast about and ask themselves: “What’s funny in this?” I despise that attitude. Sure, satirical humor is an important element, but not the only element. A good cartoonist need not be funny to be effective. Many of my best cartoons are not funny.

Basically I'm a very serious person, but I think the form it takes with me is comedy. I see the amusing side of all potentially pompous situations.

Before anyone realized it, I had become an accomplished clown.

Be a clown, be a clown, All the world loves a clown. Act the fool, play the calf, And you'll always have the last laugh.

As you see [filmmaking] makes me into a clown. And that happens to everyone — just look at Orson Welles or look at even people like Truffaut. They have become clowns.

Do those clowns really believe what they teach?