- Various
What is art? Here's the answers
The age old question provokes insightful answers, here are some of the masters responses to this predicament....
“If I could say it in words there would be no reason to paint.” Edward Hopper
“Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.” Pablo Picasso
“Great art picks up where nature ends.” Marc Chagall
“The position of the artist is humble. He is essentially a channel.” Piet Mondrian
“Those who do not want to imitate anything, produce nothing.” Salvador Dali
“The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery.” Francis Bacon
“The main thing is to be moved, to love, to hope, to tremble, to live.” Auguste Rodin
“It is important to express oneself...provided the feelings are real and are taken from you own experience.” Berthe Morisot
“Every good painter paints what he is.” Jackson Pollock
“Art is not what you see, but what you make others see.” Edgar Degas
“Whether you succeed or not is irrelevant, there is no such thing. Making your unknown known is the important thing.” Georgia O’Keeffe
“What moves men of genius, or rather what inspires their work, is not new ideas, but their obsession with the idea that what has already been said is still not enough.” Eugene Delacroix
“The artist is a receptacle for emotions that come from all over the place: from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider’s web.” Pablo Picasso
“A Good artist has less time than ideas.” Martin Kippenberger
“Don’t think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it’s good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art.” Andy Warhol
“I paint for myself. I don't know how to do anything else, anyway. Also I have to earn my living, and occupy myself.” Francis Bacon
“A work of art which did not begin in emotion is not art.” Paul Cezanne
“Have no fear of perfection, you'll never reach it.” Salvador Dali
“Poor is the pupil who does not surpass his master.” Leonardo da Vinci
“If people knew how hard I worked to get my mastery, it wouldn't seem so wonderful at all.” Michelangelo
“Art is the only way to run away without leaving home.” Twyla Tharp
“An artist cannot fail; it is a success to be one.” Charles Horton Cooley
“One can have no smaller or greater mastery than mastery of oneself.” Leonardo da Vinci
“An artist never really finishes his work; he merely abandons it.” Paul Valéry
“Life beats down and crushes the soul and art reminds you that you have one.” Stella Adler
“To send light into the darkness of men's hearts - such is the duty of the artist.” Schumann
“I want to touch people with my art. I want them to say 'he feels deeply, he feels tenderly.'” Vincent Van Gogh
“Painting is poetry that is seen rather than felt, and poetry is painting that is felt rather than seen.” Leonardo da Vinci
“Art is a lie that makes us realize truth.” Pablo Picasso
“I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free” Michelangelo
“An artist is not paid for his labor but for his vision.” James McNeill Whistler
“Great things are done by a series of small things brought together.” Vincent Van Gogh
“Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.” Scott Adams
“Painting is easy when you don't know how, but very difficult when you do.” Edgar Degas
“Inspiration does exist but it must find you working.” Pablo Picasso
“It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see.” Henry David Thoreau
“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.” Dr Suess
“If a man devotes himself to art, much evil is avoided that happens otherwise if one is idle.” Albrecht Durer
“It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child.” Pablo Picasso
“To practice any art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow. So do it.” Kurt Vonnegut
“Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.” Pablo Picasso
“Everything has its beauty, but not everyone sees it.” Andy Warhol
“The greater the artist, the greater the doubt. Perfect confidence is granted to the less talented as a consolation prize.” Robert Hughes
"If you ask me what I came to do in this world, I, an artist, will answer you: I am here to live out loud.” Émile Zola
"As practice makes perfect, I cannot but make progress; each drawing one makes, each study one paints, is a step forward." Vincent van Gogh
“Do not fear mistakes - there are none.” Miles David
“The emotions are sometimes so strong that I work without knowing it. The strokes come like speech.” Vincent Van Gogh
"If you always do what you always did - you'll always get what you always got." Unknown
“I invent nothing, I rediscover.” Auguste Rodin
“I would rather die of passion than of boredom.” Vincent van Gogh