Vincent Van Gogh Quotations

I often think that the night is more alive and more richly colored than the day.

I put my heart and my soul into my work, and have lost my mind in the process.

Great things are done by a series of small things brought together.

If you hear a voice within you say 'you cannot paint,' then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced.

For my part I know nothing with any certainty, but the sight of the stars makes me dream.

What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?

Love many things, for therein lies the true strength, and whosoever loves much performs much, and can accomplish much, and what is done in love is done well.

In spite of everything I shall rise again: I will take up my pencil, which I have forsaken in my great discouragement, and I will go on with my drawing.

I wish they would only take me as I am.

Paintings have a life of their own that derives from the painter's soul.

It is better to be high-spirited even though one makes more mistakes, than to be narrow-minded and all too prudent.

I dream of painting and then I paint my dream.

I experience a period of frightening clarity in those moments when nature is so beautiful. I am no longer sure of myself, and the paintings appear as in a dream.

I see drawings and pictures in the poorest of huts and the dirtiest of corners.

As we advance in life it becomes more and more difficult, but in fighting the difficulties the inmost strength of the heart is developed.

There may be a great fire in our hearts, yet no one ever comes to warm himself at it, and the passers-by see only a wisp of smoke.

The way to know life is to love many things.

One may have a blazing hearth in one's soul and yet no one ever came to sit by it. Passers-by see only a wisp of smoke from the chimney and continue on their way.

A good picture is equivalent to a good deed.

If one is master of one thing and understands one thing well, one has at the same time, insight into and understanding of many things.

The more I think about it, the more I realize there is nothing more artistic than to love others.

An artist needn't be a clergyman or a churchwarden, but he certainly must have a warm heart for his fellow men.

One must work and dare if one really wants to live.

If boyhood and youth are but vanity, must it not be our ambition to become men?

The fishermen know that the sea is dangerous and the storm terrible, but they have never found these dangers sufficient reason for remaining ashore.

Poetry surrounds us everywhere, but putting it on paper is, alas, not so easy as looking at it.

I can very well do without God both in my life and in my painting, but I cannot, suffering as I am, do without something which is greater than I am, which is my life, the power to create.

How can I be useful, of what service can I be? There is something inside me, what can it be?

Do not quench your inspiration and your imagination; do not become the slave of your model.

I feel that there is nothing more truly artistic than to love people

But I always think that the best way to know God is to love many things.

I am still far from being what I want to be, but with God's help I shall succeed.

Love always brings difficulties, that is true, but the good side of it is that it gives energy.

There is no blue without yellow and without orange.

Painting is a faith, and it imposes the duty to disregard public opinion.

Even the knowledge of my own fallibility cannot keep me from making mistakes. Only when I fall do I get up again.

The best way to know God is to love many things.

Those Dutchmen had hardly any imagination or fantasy, but their good taste and their scientific knowledge of composition were enormous.

It is not the language of painters but the language of nature which one should listen to, the feeling for the things themselves, for reality is more important than the feeling for pictures.

There are things which we feel to be good and true, though in the cold light of reason and calculation many things remain incomprehensible and dark. And though the society in which we live considers such actions thoughtless, or reckless, or I don't k

Love is eternal - the aspect may change, but not the essence. There is the same difference in a person before and after he is in love as there is in an unlighted lamp and one that is burning. The lamp was there and was a good lamp, but now it is shed

Love is something eternal; the aspect may change, but not the essence

One may have a blazing hearth in one's soul and yet no one ever come to sit by it. Passersby see only a wisp of smoke from the chimney and continue on the way.

One wants to be an honest man; one is so, one works hard; but still one cannot make both ends meet; on must give up the work, there is no chance of carrying it out without spending more on it than one gets back for it; one gets a feeling of shortcomi

Now since I have seen the ocean with my own eyes, I feel completely how important it is for me to stay in the south and to experience the color which must be carried to the uttermost- it is not far to Africa.

I have drawn into myself so much that I literally do not see any other people anymore-- excepting the peasants with whom I have direct contact, since I paint them.

I am always doing what I cannot do yet, in order to learn how to do it

For me, the work is an absolute necessity. I cannot put it off; I don't care for anything else; that is to say, the pleasure in something else ceases at once, and I become melancholy when I cannot go on with my work. I feel then as the weaver does wh

It always strikes me, and it is very peculiar, that when we see the image of indescribable and unutterable desolation - of loneliness, of poverty and misery, the end of all things, or their extreme - then rises in our mind the thought of God.

It is only too true that a lot of artists are mentally ill- it's a life which, to put it mildly, makes one an outsider. I'm all right when I completely immerse myself in work, but I'll always remain half crazy.

Look here, I often feel the same in more than one respect--not just in financial things, but in art itself, and in life in general. But do you think it's anything exceptional? Don't you think every man with a little spirit and energy has those moment

Firmament and planets both disappeared, but the might breath which gives life to all things and in which is bound up remained.

What a splendid thing watercolor is to express atmosphere and distance, so that the figure is surrounded by air and can breathe in it

What am I in the eyes of most people--a nonentity, an eccentric, or an unpleasant person--somebody who has no position in society and will never have; in short, the lowest of the low. All right, then--even if that were absolutely true, then I should

It would be difficult for me to express all my thoughts about it. It remains a constant disappointment to me that my drawings are not yet what I want them to be. The difficulties are indeed numerous and great, and cannot be overcome immediately. Maki

Perhaps it will seem to you that the sunshine is brighter and that everything has a new charm. At least, I believe this is always the result of a deep love, and it is a beautiful thing. And I believe people who think love prevents one from thinking clearly are wrong; for then one thinks very clearly and is more active than before. And love is something eternal--the aspect may change, but not the essence. There is the same difference in a person before and after he is in love as there is in an unlighted lamp and one that is burning. The lamp was there and it was a good lamp, but now it is shedding light too, and that is its real function. And love makes one calmer about many things, and in that way, one is more fit for one's work.

Now it so happens in the world that opposed to characters of such persons as he there are characters like mine, for instance. I care as little for the world's opinion as that man cared for what was right. To appear right was enough for him; what I th

The more I think about it, the more I realize there is nothing more artistic that to love others.

A life without love is a sinful and immoral thing.

You write in your letter something which I sometimes feel also: Sometimes I do not know how I shall pull through.

There may be a great fire in our soul, yet no one ever comes to warm himself at it, and the passers-by see only a wisp of smoke.

That God of the clergymen, He is for me as dead as a doornail. But am I an atheist for all that? The clergymen consider me as such- be it so; but I love, and how could I feel love if I did not live, and if others did not live, and then, if we live, t

I want to do drawings which touch people...In figure or landscape I should wish to express, not sentimental melancholy, but serious sorrow.

I'm able to get by very well in life, and also with my work, without beloved God. But I, a suffering human being, can not survive without there being something greater than myself, which for me is my whole life- the creative power...I want to paint m

In the end we shall have had enough of cynicism and skepticism and humbug and we shall want to live more musically

In spite of everything I shall rise again: I will take up my pencil, which I have forsaken in my great discouragement, and I will go on with my drawing

In my painting of the 'All -Night Cafe' I've tried to express the idea that the cafe is a place where one can ruin oneself, become crazy and criminal. Through the contrast of the delicate pink, blood red and dark red, of mild Louis XV and Veronese gr

I certainly hope to sell in the course of time, but I think I shall be able to influence it most effectively by working steadily on, and that at the present moment making desperate efforts to force the work I am doing now upon the public would be pretty useless.

I dream my painting and then paint my dream.

However, the painter of the future will be a colorist, such as has never yet existed. Manet was working towards it, but as you know the Impressionists have already got a stronger color than Manet. This painter of the future- I can't imagine him doing

How rich art is; if one can only remember what one has seen, one is never without food for thought or truly lonely, never alone.

And sometimes there is relief, sometimes there is new inner energy, and one stands up after it; till at last, someday, one perhaps doesn't stand up any more, que soit, but that is nothing extraordinary, and I repeat, in my opinion, such is the common

Oh! I must somehow manage to do a figure in a few strokes.

If the storm within gets too loud, I take a glass too much to stun myself.

The best pictures are always those one dreams of when one is smoking a pipe in bed, but which never get done. But still one ought to try, however incompetent one may feel before the unspeakable perfection and radiant splendour of nature.

Christ is more of an artist than the artists; he works in the living spirit and the living flesh, he makes men instead of statues.

It is true that every day has its own evil, and its good too. But how difficult must life be, especially farther on when the evil of each day increases as far as worldly things go, if it is not strengthened and comforted by faith. And in Christ all worldly things may become better, and, as it were, sanctified. Theo, woe is me if I do not preach the Gospel; if I did not aim at that and possess faith and hope in Christ, it would be bad for me indeed, but no I have some courage.

You will say that everyone has seen landscapes and figures from childhood on. The question is: Has everybody also been reflexive as a child? Has everybody who has seen them also loved heath, fields, meadows, woods, and the snow and the rain and the s.

I believe that it may happen that one will succeed, and one must not begin to despair, even though defeated here and there; and even though one sometimes feels a kind of decay, though things go differently from the expected, it is necessary to take heart again and new courage. For the great things are not done by impulse, but by a series of small things brought together. And great things are not something accidental, but must certainly be willed. What is drawing? How does one learn it? It is working through an invisible iron wall that seems to stand between what one feels and what one can do.

... life is too short to do the whole.

It is not only by one's impulses that one achieves greatness, but also by patiently filing away the steel wall that separates what one feels from what one is capable of doing.

Many painters are afraid of the blank canvas, but the blank canvas is afraid of the truly passionate painter who dares-and who has once broken the spell of 'you can't.'

Admire as much as you can. Most people do not admire enough.

There may be a time in life when one is tired of everything and feels as if all one does is wrong, and there maybe some truth in it- do you think this is a feeling one must try to forget and to banish, or is it 'the longing for God,' which one must not fear, but cherish to see if it may bring us some good? Is it 'the longing for God' which leads us to make a choice which we never regret? Let us keep courage and try to be patient and gentle. And not mind being eccentric, and make distinction between good and evil.

The majority of (painters), because they aren't colorists, do not see yellow, orange or sulphur in the South (of France) and they call a painter mad if he sees with eyes other than theirs

I feel the need of relations and friendship, of affection, of friendly intercourse.... I cannot miss these things without feeling, as does any other intelligent man, a void and a deep need.

Painting it was hard graft... in addition red, yellow, brown ochre, black, terra sienna, bistre, and the result is a red-brown that varies from bistre to deep wine-red and to pale, blond reddish...

Painting it was hard graft. There are one and a half large tubes of white in the ground - yet that ground is very dark...

Instead of trying to reproduce exactly what I see before me, I make an arbitrary use of color to express myself more forcefully.

I lost my job as an art salesman. It was the customer's fault. He wanted to buy the wrong paintings.

Life itself, too, is forever turning an infinitely vacant, dispiriting blank side towards man on which nothing appears, any more than it does on a blank canvas. But no matter how vacant and vain, how dead life may appear to be, the man of faith, of energy, of warmth, who knows something, will not be put off so easily.

I believe that one thinks much more soundly if the thoughts arise from direct contact with things, than if one looks at things with the aim of finding this or that in them.

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!

It may be true that there is no God here, but there must be one not far off, and at such a moment one feels His presence; which comes to the same as saying (and I readily give this sincere profession of faith): I believe in God, and that it is His wi

To believe in God for me is to feel that there is a God, not a dead one, or a stuffed one, who with irresistible force urges us towards more loving.

Painters understand nature and love it, and teach us to see.

People are often unable to do anything, imprisoned as they are in I don't know what kind of terrible, terrible, oh such terrible cage.

To express the love of two lovers by a marriage of two complementary colors, their mingling and their opposition, the mysterious vibrations of Kindred tones. To express the thought of a brow by the radiance of light tone against a somber background; to express hope by some star, the eagerness of a soul by a sunset radiance.

I painted two pictures of myself lately, one of which has rather the true character ... I always think photographs abominable, and I don't like to have them around, particularly not those of persons I know and love.... photographic portraits wither much sooner than we ourselves do, whereas the painted portrait is a thing which is felt, done with love or respect for the human being that is portrayed.

I devour nature ceaselessly. I exaggerate, sometimes I make changes in the subject; but still I don't invent the whole picture. On the contrary, I find it already there. It's a question of picking out what one wants from nature.