Emily Carr on art and religion

"Emily Carr et ses amis" by Joe Fafard on Sherbrooke St. West
near St. Mathieu, 20 April 2013  

July 16th, 1933

Once I heard it stated and now I believe it to be true that there is no true art without religion. The artist himself may not think he is religious but if he is sincere his sincerity in itself is religion. If something other than the material did not speak to him, and if he did not have faith in that something and also in himself, he would not try to express it. Every artist I meet these days seems to me to leak out something, some in one way, some in another, tip-toeing, stretching up, longing for something beyond what he sees or can reach.

Emily Carr, Hundreds and Thousands, the Journals of Emily Carr, Clarke, Irwin & Company Limited, Toronto/Vancouver, 1966. P. 41.