It has bothered me all my life that I do not paint like everybody else.
~HENRI MATISSE
Only when he no longer knows what he is doing does the painter do good things.
~EDGAR DEGAS
It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child.
~PABLO PICASSO
I shut my eyes in order to see.
~PAUL GAUGUIN
As a suffering creature, I cannot do without something greater than I--something that is my life--the power to create.
~Vincent Van Gogh
I paint in order not to cry.
~PAUL KLEE
If one could only reproduce nature, and always with less beauty than the original, why paint at all?
~GEORGIA O'KEEFE
It is only after a sort of "get acquainted" period that I see what I have been about. I have no fears about making changes, destroying the image, etc., because the painting has a life of its own. I try to let it come through.
~JACKSON POLLACK
There are painters who transform the sun into a yellow spot, but there are others who, thanks to their art and intelligence, transform a yellow spot into the sun.
~PABLO PICASSO
You should keep on painting no matter how difficult it is, because this is all part of experience, and the more experience you can have, the better it is---unless it kills you, and then you know you have gone too far.
~Alice Neel
Painting from nature is not copying the object; it is realizing one's sensations.
~PAUL CEZANNE
An artist is a creature driven by demons. He doesn't know why they chose
him and is usually too busy to wonder why.
~WILLIAM FAULKNER
God is really another artist. He invented the giraffe, the elephant, and the cat. He has no real style. He just goes on trying other things.
~PABLO PICASSO
Painting is a faith, and it imposes the duty to disregard public opinion.
~Vincent Van Gogh
I hate flowers. I only paint them because they're cheaper than models and they don't move.
~GEORGIA O'KEEFE
Artists can color the sky red because they know it's blue. Those of us who aren't artists must color things the way they are or people might think we're stupid.
~HENRI MATISSE
