Poussin in The Louvre

Painting is old and of the classical world. It asks that you see things as if they are original. Painting is the one that searches Athens for an honest man, that defies Alexander by telling him that he's standing in your light.

http://www.wga.hu/html_m/p/poussin/3/05landsc.html

It is easier to talk about bad painting than it is good painting. Good painting may be minsunderstood as bad painting as easily as bad painting is misunderstood as good.

A good painting is alive on the wall; it is like a lamp in the daylight looking for a human being. A bad painting is a human being defined by Plato as a 'featherless biped.' A good painting knows you're looking; a bad painting looks at you like you've done something wrong.

If you hold your breath just before you die, that is a good painting. A bad painting is more complicated--you can become ill from bad painting, like eating bad octopus or suffering an infection from a dog bite--but you cannot die from bad painting.