Henri Matisse Art Quotations

There are always flowers for those who want to see them.

I don't paint things. I only paint the difference between things.

An artist must never be a prisoner. Prisoner? An artist should never be a prisoner of himself, prisoner of style, prisoner of reputation, prisoner of success, etc.

With color one obtains an energy that seems to stem from witchcraft.

Drawing is like making an expressive gesture with the advantage of permanence.

A picture must possess a real power to generate light and for a long time now I've been conscious of expressing myself through light or rather in light.

There is nothing more difficult for a truly creative painter than to paint a rose, because before he can do so he has first to forget all the roses that were ever painted.

I do not literally paint that table, but the emotion it produces upon me.

It has bothered me all my life that I do not paint like everybody else.

Time extracts various values from a painter's work. When these values are exhausted the pictures are forgotten, and the more a picture has to give, the greater it is.

I would like to recapture that freshness of vision which is characteristic of extreme youth when all the world is new to it.

What I dream of is an art of balance, of purity and serenity devoid of troubling or depressing subject matter - a soothing, calming influence on the mind, rather like a good armchair which provides relaxation from physical fatigue.

Cutting into color reminds me of the sculptor's direct carving.

You study, you learn, but you guard the original naivete. It has to be within you, as desire for drink is within the drunkard or love is within the lover.

I don't know whether I believe in God or not. I think, really, I'm some sort of Buddhist. But the essential thing is to put oneself in a frame of mind which is close to that of prayer.

I wouldn't mind turning into a vermilion goldfish.

The only valid thing in art is the one thing that cannot be explained, to explain away the mystery of a great painting would do irreplaceable harm, for whenever you explain or define something you substitute the explanation or the definition for the

I dream of an art of balance, of quietness, something analogous to a good armchair.

The arts have a development which comes not only from the individual but also from a whole acquired force, the civilization which precedes us. One cannot do just anything. A talented artist cannot do whatever he pleases. If he only used his gifts, he would not exist. We are not the masters of what we produce. It is imposed on us.

I have always sought to be understood and, while I was taken to task by critics or colleagues, I thought they were right, assuming I had not been clear enough to be understood. This assumption allowed me to work my whole life without hatred and even without bitterness toward criticism, regardless of its source. I counted solely on the clarity of expression of my work to gain my ends. Hatred, rancor, and the spirit of vengeance are useless baggage to the artist. His road is difficult enough for him to cleanse his soul of everything which could make it more so.

A work of art must carry in itself its complete significance and impose it upon the beholder even before he can identify the subject-matter...

When I put a green, it is not grass. When I put a blue, it is not the sky.

Did not the artists of the great age of Japanese art change names many times during their careers? I like that; they wanted to safeguard their freedom.

Composition is the art of arranging in a decorative manner the various elements which the painter uses to express his sentiments. In a picture every separate part will be visible and... everything which has no utility in the picture is for that reason harmful.

The importance of an artist is to be measured by the quantity of new signs which he has introduced to the language of art.

Each work of art is a collection of signs invented during the picture's execution to suit the needs of their position. Taken out of the composition for which they were created, these signs have no further use.

All art worthy of the name is religious.

Art is an escape from reality.

All my efforts go into creating an art that can be understood by everyone.

Truth and reality in art begin at the point where the artist ceases to understand what he is doing and capable of doing - yet feels in himself a force that becomes steadily stronger... and more concentrated.

What's so astonishing about not understanding? There are so many things in art, beginning with art itself, that one doesn't understand. A painter doesn't see everything that he has put in his painting.

Modern art spreads joy around by its color, which calms us.

The Barnes Foundation is the only sane place to see art in America.

...The more a picture has to give, the greater it is.

...I am driven on by an idea that I really only grasp as it grows with the picture.

In art, truth and reality begin when one no longer understands what one is doing or what one knows, and when there remains an energy that is all the stronger for being constrained, controlled and compressed.

Arrival = Prison, and the artist must never be a prisoner.

Creation is the artist's true function; where there is no creation there is no art.

I want to reach that condensation of sensations that constitutes a picture.

Seek the strongest color effect possible... the content is of no importance.

What I dream of is an art of balance.

The portrait is one of the most curious art forms. It demands special qualities in the artist, and an almost total kinship with the model.

Work cures everything.

If it is practiced by a man of taste, the photograph will have the appearance of art (but) the photographer must...intervene as little as possible, so as not to lose the objective charm which it naturally possesses.

Would not it be best to leave room to mystery?

Much of the beauty that arises in art comes from the struggle an artist wages with his limited medium.

What interests me most is neither still life nor landscape: it is the human figure.

Truth and reality in art do not arise until you no longer understand what you are doing and are capable of but nevertheless sense a power that grows in proportion to your resistance.

It is not enough to place colors, however beautiful, one beside the other; colors must also react on one another. Otherwise, you have cacophony.

Impressionism is the newspaper of the soul.

Slowly I discovered the secret of my art. It consists of a meditation on nature, on the expression of a dream which is always inspired by reality. With more involvement and regularity, I learned to push each study in a certain direction. Little by little the notion that painting is a means of expression asserted itself, and that one can express the same thing in several ways. Exactitude is not truth, Delacroix liked to say.

All that is not useful in a picture is detrimental. A work of art must be harmonious in its entirety; for superfluous details would, in the mind of the beholder, encroach upon the essential elements.

It would be a mistake to ascribe this creative power to an inborn talent. In art, the genius creator is not just a gifted being, but a person who has succeeded in arranging for their appointed end, a complex of activities, of which the work is the outcome. The artist begins with a vision — a creative operation requiring an effort. Creativity takes courage.

Art should be something like a good armchair in which to rest from physical fatigue.

It is my dream to create an art which is filled with balance, purity and calmness, freed from a subject matter that is disconcerting or too attention-seeking. In my paintings, I wish to create a spiritual remedy, similar to a comfortable armchair which provides rest from physical expectation for the spiritually working, the businessman as well as the artist.

Don't wait for inspiration. It comes while one is working.