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Artist Quotes

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Artist Quotes

“The artist... standing in the position of mediator between the world of his experience and the world of his dreams - 'a mediator, consequently gifted with twin faculties, a selective faculty and a reproductive faculty.' To equate these faculties was the secret of artistic success.”

World Dream Success Artist Secret Position Standing Artistic Faculty Twins Gifted Selective Mediators

Book:Delphi Complete Works of James Joyce (Illustrated)

Source: Delphi Complete Works of James Joyce (Illustrated)

“An artist must have his measuring tools not in the hand, but in the eye.”

Hands Eye Artist Tools Measuring

Book:The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti: Based on Studies in the Archives of the Buonarroti Family at Florence

Source: The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti: Based on Studies in the Archives of the Buonarroti Family at Florence

“I am no artist - please come and help me.”

Helping Artist Please Help Me Insecurity

Author:Michelangelo

“Today, as you know, I am famous and very rich. But when I am alone with myself, I haven't the 'courage' to consider myself an artist, in the great and ancient sense of that word... I am only a public entertainer, who understands his age.”

Knows Age Today Artist Rich Havens Ancient Entertainers

Author:Pablo Picasso

“When the individuality of the artist begins to express itself, what the artist gains in the way of liberty he loses in the way of order.”

Way Artist Order Loses Liberty Gains Chaos Individuality

Author:Pablo Picasso

“Let them understand above all that the artist works from necessity; that he, too, is a minute element of the world to whom one should ascribe no more importance than so many things in nature which charm us but which we do not explain to ourselves.”

World Should Artist Minutes Elements Importance Charm

Author:Pablo Picasso

“An artist must be very careful not to look for models. As soon as one artist takes another as model, he is lost. There is no other point of departure than reality.”

Looks Reality Artist Lost Models Careful Departure

Author:Pablo Picasso

“When you see what you express through photography, you realize all the things that can no longer be the objectives of painting. Why should an artist persist in treating subjects that can be established so clearly with the lens of a camera?”

Should Artist Realizing Subjects Painting Photography Cameras Objectives Persist Lenses

Author:Pablo Picasso

“No doubt, it is useful for an artist to know all the forms of art which have preceded or which accompany his. That is a sign of strength if it is a question of looking for a stimulus or recognizing mistakes he must avoid.”

Ifs Knows Art Form Artist Mistake Doubt Strength No Doubt Recognizing Stimulus Accompany

Author:Pablo Picasso

“I have been given a unique role to play on this earth: given to me by a life filled with sickness, ill-starred circumstances and my profession as an artist. It is a life that contains nothing that resembles happiness, and moreover does not even desire happiness.”

Doe Has Beens Play Earth Desire Artist Given Roles Circumstances Unique Filled Ill Profession Sickness

Book:Encounter in Space: Double Images in the Graphic Art of Edvard Munch

Source: Encounter in Space: Double Images in the Graphic Art of Edvard Munch

“An artist's studio should be a small space because small rooms discipline the mind and large ones distract it.”

Should Mind Artist Space Rooms Discipline Studios Small Spaces Small Rooms

Author:Leonardo da Vinci

“Why seek to embarrass [the artist] with vanities foreign to his quietness? Know you not that certain sciences require the whole man, leaving no part of him at leisure for your trifles?”

Knows Men Whole Artist Certain Leaving Vanity Leisure Trifles Quietness

Author:Leonardo da Vinci

“It's the artist's duty to have an artist's life, somehow to obtain time and freedom and then to muster the desire and discipline to make good work out of the life, whether that goodness is in the world's aesthetics, its radicalism, its candor, its singularity, or its universality.”

World Desire Artist Responsibility Duty Discipline Goodness Work Out Good Work Aesthetics Singularity Candor Muster Universality Radicalism

Book:Epicurean Simplicity

Source: Epicurean Simplicity

“I do not think it is any benefit for artists or fans to have all the new, wide distribution channels in the online world controlled by those who have controlled the old, narrower ones, .. This is especially true if they achieve that control by leveraging their dominance in content or conduit space in an anticompetitive way to control the new, independent music services that are attempting to enhance the consumer's experience of music.”

Ifs Thinking World Way Artist Space Fans Achieve Benefits Independent Wide Consumers Online Controlled Distribution Attempting Dominance Independent Music

Author:Orrin Hatch

“[The artist] speaks to our capacity for delight and wonder, to the sense of mystery surrounding our lives; to our sense of pity, and beauty, and pain; to the latent feeling of fellowship with all creation--and to the subtle but invincible conviction of solidarity in dreams, in joy, in sorrow, in aspirations, in illusions, in hope, in fear which binds together all humanity--the dead to the living and the living to the unborn.”

Source: The Portable Conrad

“Others may be able to accept standards from another, but an artist is a person who decides.”

May Persons Able Artist Accepting Standards

Author:William Stafford

“In a world that has ceased to believe in sin, the artist is responsible for the preaching.”

World Believe Artist Sin Morality Responsible Preaching

Book:Notebooks, 1942-1951

Source: Notebooks, 1942-1951

“The channel of art can only become clogged and misdirected by the artist's concern with merely temporary and local disturbances. The song is higher than the struggle.”

Art Artist Song Struggle Higher Concern Difficulty Locals Temporary Disturbance

Book:Blood, Bread, and Poetry: Selected Prose 1979-1985

Source: Blood, Bread, and Poetry: Selected Prose 1979-1985

“To be able to observe with a stranger's eye helps one to see with an artist's eye. What alienates us inspires.”

Helping Eye Able Artist Inspire Stranger Observation

Book:The substance of man

Source: The substance of man

“The artist, depicting man disdainful of the storm and stress of life, is no less reconciling and healing than the poet who, while endowing Nature and Humanity, rejoices in its measureless superiority to human passions and human sorrows.”

Men Humans Life Is Artist Humanity Passion Healing Poet Sorrow Stress Storm Rejoice Superiority

Book:The Florentine painters. The Central Italian painters

Source: The Florentine painters. The Central Italian painters

“Sometimes two artists wanna work together, but it doesn't mean it's gonna happen, because you have to find the right idea.”

Mean Two Ideas Sometimes Happens Together Artist Working Together Right Ideas

Author:David Guetta

“When creativity has become your habit; when you've learned to manage time, resources, expectations, and the demands of others; when you understand the value and place of validation, continuity, and purity of purpose, then you're on the way to an artist's ultimate goal; the achievement of mastery.”

Way Purpose Artist Values Goal Creativity Habit Demand Achievement Expectations Resources Ultimate Manage Purity Mastery Continuity Validation Ultimate Goal

Author:Twyla Tharp

“It seems to me that today if the artist wishes to be serious... he must once more sink himself in solitude.”

Ifs Seems Today Artist Wish Serious Solitude

Book:Edgar Degas

Source: Edgar Degas

“I find that it is important to work slowly. Anyone who looks at such a canvas will follow the same path the artist took, and he will experience that it is the path which counts more than the outcome of it, and that the route taken has been the most interesting part.”

Looks Has Beens Important Artist Interesting Path Taken Outcomes Canvas Routes Most Interesting

Author:Georges Braque

“In so far as he is a creator, the artist does not belong to a social group already moulded by a culture, but to a culture which he is by way of building up.”

Way Doe Artist Culture Social Groups Building Creator Building Up Social Groups

Author:Andre Malraux

“The Artist submits from day to day to the fatal rhythm of the impulses of the universal world which encloses him, continual centre of sensations, always pliant, hypnotized by the marvels of nature which he loves, he scrutinizes. His eyes, like his soul, are in perpetual communion with the most fortuitous of phenomena.”

World Soul Eye Artist Universal Rhythm Impulse His Eyes Sensations Perpetual Submit Communion Day To Day Centre Scrutinize Fortuitous

Book:Nature and Imagination: The Work of Odilon Redon

Source: Nature and Imagination: The Work of Odilon Redon

“The artist yields often to the stimuli of materials that will transmit his spirit.”

Spirit Artist Materials Yield Stimulus Transmit

Author:Odilon Redon

“Artists who approach perfection do not have many ideas.”

Ideas Artist Approach Perfection

Author:Odilon Redon

“The good work proceeds with tenacity, intention, without interruption, with an equal measure of passion and reason and it must surpass that goal the artist has set for himself.”

Reason Artist Passion Goal Equal Intention Good Work Tenacity Interruptions

Author:Odilon Redon

“The artist's business is to feel, although he may think a little sometimes... when he has nothing better to do.”

Thinking Feels May Littles Sometimes Artist Business

Author:John Ruskin

“I am of use to the younger artists through the advice and criticism which I give them.”

Giving Use Artist Advice Criticism

Author:Howard Pyle

“The artist envies what the arties gains, The bard the rival bard's successful strains.”

Artist Successful Gains Envy Strain Rivals Bards

Author:Hesiod

“An artist's flair is sometimes worth a scientist's brains.”

Sometimes Artist Brain Scientist Flair

Author:Anton Chekhov

“An artist must only judge of what he understands, his field is just as limited as that of any other specialist... That in his sphere there are no questions, but only answers, can only be maintained by those who have never written and have had no experience of thinking in images.”

Artist Answers Fields Judgment Criticism Range Specialists

Author:Anton Chekhov

“I am not a liberal, not a conservative, not a believer in gradual progress, not a monk. I should like to be a free artist and nothing more.”

Should Artist Freedom Progress Conservative Believer Monk

Book:The Life and Genius of Anton Chekhov: Letters, Diary, Reminiscences and Biography: Assorted Collection of Autobiographical Writings of the Renowned Russian Author and Playwright of Uncle Vanya, The Cherry Orchard, The Three Sisters and The Seagull

Source: The Life and Genius of Anton Chekhov: Letters, Diary, Reminiscences and Biography: Assorted Collection of Autobiographical Writings of the Renowned Russian Author and Playwright of Uncle Vanya, The Cherry Orchard, The Three Sisters and The Seagull

“You confuse two things: solving a problem and stating a problem correctly. It is only the second that is obligatory for an artist.”

Two Problem Artist Two Things

Book:The Collected Works of Anton Chekhov: Novellas, Short Stories, Plays, Letters & Diary: Three Sisters, Seagull , The Shooting Party, Uncle Vanya, Cherry Orchard, Chameleon, Tripping Tongue, On The Road, Vanka, Ward No. Six, Swedish Match, Nightmare, Bear, Reluctant Hero, Joy…

Source: The Collected Works of Anton Chekhov: Novellas, Short Stories, Plays, Letters & Diary: Three Sisters, Seagull , The Shooting Party, Uncle Vanya, Cherry Orchard, Chameleon, Tripping Tongue, On The Road, Vanka, Ward No. Six, Swedish Match, Nightmare, Bear, Reluctant Hero, Joy…

“As for techniques and processes, as seen in the works themselves, neither public nor artists will find anything about them here. Those things are learned in the studio and the public is interested only in the results.”

Artist Process Results Studios Technique Methodology

Book:Baudelaire: Selected Writings on Art and Artists

Source: Baudelaire: Selected Writings on Art and Artists

“Gauguin says that when sailors have to move a heavy load or raise an anchor, they all sing together to keep them up and give them vim. That's just what artists lack!”

Giving Together Moving Artist Raises Heavy Load Anchors Sailor Heavy Loads Vim

Author:Vincent Van Gogh

“The more I become decomposed, the more sick and fragile I am, the more I become an artist.”

Artist Health Sick Fragile

Author:Vincent Van Gogh

“Only he who possesses a personal religion, an original view of infinity, can be an artist.”

Way Artist Views Originals Individuality Infinity

Author:Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel

“An artist doesn't really create anything - he just rearranges what is already there.”

Author:Paramahansa Yogananda

“The great artist is a formulation of the greatest intelligence: he is the recipient of sensations which are the most delicate and consequently the most invisible expressions of the brain.”

Artist Brain Expression Invisible Sensations Delicate Great Art Great Artist

Book:An Exhibition of Paintings, Engravings & Sculpture [by] Gauguin

Source: An Exhibition of Paintings, Engravings & Sculpture [by] Gauguin

“My God! How terrible these money questions are for an artist!”

Artist Money Terrible

Author:Paul Gauguin

“The public wants to understand and learn in a single day, a single minute, what the artist has spent years learning.”

Want Years Artist Time Minutes

Book:The writings of a savage

Source: The writings of a savage

“The damnable thing about bad art is that the insincerity which lies at its roots is not perceived by the artist himself.”

Art Lying Artist Art Is Roots Sincerity Insincerity

Author:Quentin Bell

“The responsibility of the artist consists in perfecting his work so that it may become attractively disinteresting.”

May Artist Interest Responsibility

Book:Silence: Lectures and Writings, 50th Anniversary Edition

Source: Silence: Lectures and Writings, 50th Anniversary Edition

“An artist recreates those aspects of reality which represent his fundamental view of man's nature.”

Men Reality Artist Views Aspect Fundamentals

Book:Ayn Rand Reader

Source: Ayn Rand Reader

“At times failure is very necessary for the artist. It reminds him that failure is not the ultimate disaster. And this reminder liberates him from the mean fussing of perfectionism.”

Mean Artist Perfection Ultimate Disaster Reminders Perfectionism Fussing

Book:A Painter of Our Time

Source: A Painter of Our Time

“There's the artist's intimacy and truthfulness to himself, but an equal intimacy to the Other [the one drawn]. Picasso drawings are like that... the Rembrandts are like that. The artist who most often did that was Van Gogh.”

Artist Equal Drawing Intimacy Vans Truthfulness

Author:John Berger

“I was always aware, reading Chesterton, that there was someone writing this who rejoiced in words, who deployed them on the page as an artist deploys his paints upon his palette. Behind every Chesterton sentence there was someone painting with words, and it seemed to me that at the end of any particularly good sentence or any perfectly-put paradox, you could hear the author, somewhere behind the scenes, giggling with delight.”

Writing Ends Joy Artist Reading Behinds Scene Pages Paint Delight Sentences Paradox Behind The Scenes Palette

Book:The View from the Cheap Seats: Selected Nonfiction

Source: The View from the Cheap Seats: Selected Nonfiction