Favorite Inspiring Art Quotes Throughout the Ages

Collecting quotes has always been a secret hobby of mine. Over the years I have found many inspiring quotes in books or on the Internet, but also in some random places like tea bags, fortune cookies, and even bathroom walls.

In this post, I’m sharing a few of my favorites.

A single positive phrase from a wise person has the power to uplift my spirits and motivate or inspire me throughout the day. So, I decided to share some of my favorite ‘art quotes’ with you. I hope you enjoy them.

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“Art is not a thing; it is a way.” ~Elbert Hubbard
“Painting is just another way of keeping a diary.” ~Pablo Picasso
“Painting is poetry that is seen rather than felt, and poetry is painting that is felt rather than seen.” ~Leonardo da Vinci
“To send light into the darkness of men’s hearts – such is the duty of the artist.” ~Schumman
“An artist cannot fail; it is a success to be one.” ~Charles Horton Cooley
“Artists must be men of wit, consciously or unconsciously philosophers; read, study and think a great deal of life…” ~Robert Henri
“Art washes away from the sould the dust of everyday life.” ~Pablo Picasso
“All art requires courage.” ~Anne Tucker
“When inspiration doesn’t come, I go halfway to meet it.” ~Freud
“Art is the most intense mode of individualism that the world has known.” ~Oscar Wilde
“Painting is easy when you don’t know how, but very difficult when you do.” ~Edgar Degas
“The day is an empty canvas, the shapes and colors are yours to choose.” ~Alex Noble
“I would like to paint the way a bird sings.” ~Claude Monet
“Pictures must not be too picturesque.” ~Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Imagination is more important than knowledge.” ~Albert Einstein
“An artist is like a prophet.  He must lead people and help them get acquainted with what he sees.” ~George Butendorp
“Painting is a source of endless pleasure, but also of great anguish.” ~Balthus
“If people knew how hard I worked to get my mastery, it wouldn’t seem so wonderful at all.” ~Michelangelo
“Anyone who says you can’t see a thought simply doesn’t know art.” ~Wynetka Ann Reynolds
“Great art picks up where nature ends.” ~Marc Chagall
“What art offers is space – a certain breathing room for the spirit.” ~John Updike
“Everything depends on the attitude of the artist toward his subject. It is essential.” ~Robert Henri
“An artist is someone who produces things that people don’t need to have but that he – for some reason – thinks it would be a good idea to give them.” ~Andy Warhol
“Artists are fiery, they do not weep!” ~Ludwig van Beethoven
“God and other artists are always a little obscure.” ~Oscar Wilde
“The only time I am truly in the Now is when I paint.” ~Lori McNee
“I found I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn’t say any other way – things I had no words for.” ~Georgia O’Keeffe
“Man will begin to recover the moment he takes art as seriously as physics, chemistry, or money.” ~Ernst Levy
“Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.” ~Pablo Picasso
“Creativity takes courage.” ~ Henri Matisse
“I paint myself because I am alone. I paint myself because I am the subject I know best.” ~Frida Kahlo
“I dream a lot. I do more painting when I’m not painting. It’s in the subconscious..” ~Andrew Wyeth
“Artists who seek perfection in everything are those who can’t attain it in anything.” ~Eugene Delacroix
“The world today doesn’t make sense, so why should I paint pictures that do?” ~Pablo Picasso
“That stroke you are about to make on a painting is as much you as the next word you utter or the next breath you take.” ~Harley Brown
“An artist never really finishes his work; he merely abandons it.” ~Paul Valéry
“If one really loves nature, one can find beauty everywhere.” ~Vincent van Gogh
“All true artists, whether they know it or not, create from a place of no-mind, from inner stillness.” ~Echkart Tolle
“The artist does not see things as they are, but as he is.” ~Alfred Tonnelle
“Without art, the crudeness of reality would make the world unbearable.” ~George Bernard Shaw
“Fine art is that in which the hand, the head, and the heart of man go together.” ~John Ruskin
“I dream my paintings, and then they paint my dream.” ~Vincent Van Gogh
“Where the spirit does not work with the hand there is no art.” ~Leonard da Vinci

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You might like to read:
The Importance of Art & Attitude‘
“What I know for Sure.” by Oprah.
How to Embrace to Power of Giving