Auguste Renoir Quotes
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How is it that in the so-called barbarian ages art was understood, whereas in our age of progress exactly the opposite is true?
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It took me twenty years to discover painting: twenty years looking at nature, and above all, going to the Louvre.
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They tell you that a tree is only a combination of chemical elements. I prefer to believe that God created it, and that it is inhabited by a nymph.
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What is to be done about these literary people, who will never understand that painting is a craft and that the material side comes first? The ideas come afterwards, when the picture is finished.
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Be a good craftsman; it won't stop you from being a genius.
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You haven't time to think about the composition. In working directly from nature, the painter ends up by simply aiming at an effect, and not composing the picture at all; and he soon becomes monotonous.
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The purpose of painting is to decorate the walls. Therefore it has to be as rich as possible.
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I consider that women who are authors, lawyers, and politicians are monsters.
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You come to nature with all her theories, and she knocks them all flat.
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If you paint the leaf on a tree without using a model, your imagination will only supply you with a few leaves; but Nature offers you millions, all on the same tree. No two leaves are exactly the same. The artist who paints only what is in his mind must very soon repeat himself.
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Shall I tell you what I think are the two qualities of a work of art? First, it must be indescribable, and second, it must be inimitable.
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I'm still afflicted with the malady of research. I don't like what I do, and I paint it out, and paint it out again. I hope this mania will come to an end... I'm like a child at school. The white page must always be evenly written and slap! bang! and there's a blot! I'm still blotting and I'm forty years old.
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To my mind, a picture should be something pleasant, cheerful, and pretty, yes pretty! There are too many unpleasant things in life as it is without creating still more of them.
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To be an artist you must learn the laws of nature.
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The artist who uses the least of what is called imagination will be the greatest.
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I never think I have finished a nude until I think I could pinch it.
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Progress in painting, there's no such thing! ...One day I went and changed the yellow on my palette. Well, the result was, I floundered for ten years!
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I've never let one day go by without painting, or at least without drawing.
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It is not enough for a painter to be a clever craftsman; he must love to 'caress' his canvas, too.
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Work lovingly done is the secret of all order and all happiness.
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One must from time to time attempt things that are beyond one's capacity.
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Regularity, order, desire for perfection destroy art. Irregularity is the basis of all art.
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Out-of-doors there is a greater variety of light than in the studio, where the light is always the same. But that is just the trouble; one is carried away by the light, and besides, one can't see what one is doing.