Edgar Degas quotes - page 2

A painting is above all a product of the artist's imagination, it must never be a copy. If, at a later stage, he wants to add two or three touches from nature, of course it doesn't spoil anything. (Edgar Degas)
We were created to look at one another, weren't we. View quote
Edgar Degas
Even working from nature you have to compose. View quote
Edgar Degas
You have to have a high conception, not of what you are doing, but of what you may do one day: without that, there's no point in working. View quote
Edgar Degas
Drawing is not the same as form; it is a way of seeing form. View quote
Edgar Degas
We also consider that Miss Berthe Morisot's [woman painter in French Impressionism who got later married with a brother of Eduard Manet] name and talent are too important to us to do without. [Degas is referring to her participation in the first Impressionist's show he was preparing, then; he was in strong opposition to Eduard Manet who wanted to exclude Berthe Morisot) View quote
Edgar Degas
If I were the government I would have a special brigade of gendarmes to keep an eye on artists who paint landscapes from nature. Oh, I don't mean to kill anyone; just a little dose of bird-shot now and then as a warning. View quote
Edgar Degas
I am busy on a portrait of my self and my aunt and my two cousins, I will show it to you when you get back. I am doing it as if I were doing a picture. I've got to do it well, because I want to leave it as a memento.... The older one is really a lovely thing, the younger one has the devil in her as well as the kindness of an angel. I am doing them with their black dresses and little white pinafores which suit them delightfully. I have ideas for the picture's background running through my head. I would like a certain gracefulness with a nobleness of feeling that I don't know how to describe. View quote
Edgar Degas
Oh! Women can never forgive me. They hate me, they can feel that I ‘m disarming them. I show them without their coquetry, in the states of animals cleaning themselves... ...I'm sure of it; they see me as the enemy. Fortunately, since if they did like me, that would be the end of me. View quote
Edgar Degas
Drawing is not what you see but what you must make others see. View quote
Edgar Degas
Painting is not very difficult when you don't know how; but when you know, oh! then, it's another matter. (Edgar Degas)
An artist is a deception.. ..an artist is only an artist at certain times, by an effort of will.. ..the study of nature is a cliché; isn't Manet the living proof? For although he prided himself on slavishly copying nature, he was the most inadequate painter in the world, not making a single brushstroke without reference to the old masters; for instance, he refrained from drawing fingernails because Frans Hals did not draw them. View quote
Edgar Degas
I, marry? Oh, I could never bring myself to do it. I would have been in mortal misery all my life for fear my wife might say, "That's a pretty little thing," after I had finished a picture. View quote
Edgar Degas
Another Visitor: How did you manage, Monsieur Degas, when you painted that plein air called 'Le Plage', the one Monsieur Rouart has? Degas: It was quite simple. I spread my flannel vest on the floor of the studio, and had the model sit on it. You see, the air you breathe in a picture is not necessarily the same as the air out of doors. View quote
Edgar Degas
Poor Gauguin, 'way off there on his island! I'll wager he spends most of his time thinking of Rue Lafitte. I advised him to go to New Orleans, but he decided it was too civilized. He had to have people around him with flowers on their heads and rings in their noses before he could feel at home. Now if I should leave my house for more than two days... View quote
Edgar Degas
It is very good to copy what one sees; it is much better to draw what you can't see any more but is in your memory. It is a transformation in which imagination and memory work together. You only reproduce what struck you, that is to say the necessary. View quote
Edgar Degas
No art is less spontaneous than mine. What I do is the result of reflection and the study of the great masters. View quote
Edgar Degas
In painting you must give the idea of the true by means of the false. View quote
Edgar Degas
Certainly, Vollard, but listen: will you have a special dish without butter prepared for me? Mind you, no flowers on the table, and you must have dinner at half past seven sharp. I know you won't have your cat around and please don't allow anybody to bring a dog. And if there are to be any women I hope they won't come reeking of perfume. How horrible all those odors are when there are so many things that really smell good, like toast - or even manure! Ah - (a short hesitation), and very few lights. My eyes, you know, my poor eyes! View quote
Edgar Degas
I will not admit that a woman can draw like that. View quote
Edgar Degas
Hitherto the nude has always been represented in poses which presuppose an audience; but these women of mine are honest, simple folk, unconcerned by any other interests than those involved in their physical condition. Here is another; she is washing her feet. It is as if you looked through a key-hole. (Edgar Degas)
You need the natural life; I, the artificial. View quote
Edgar Degas
Make portraits of people in familiar and typical positions, above all give their faces the same choice of expression one gives their bodies. Thus if laughter is typical for a person, make him laugh – there are, naturally, feelings that one cannot render... View quote
Edgar Degas
I believe Corot painted a tree better that any of us, but still I find him superior in his figures. View quote
Edgar Degas
I really have some luggage in my head. If only there were insurance companies for that as there are for so many things here, there's a bale I should insure at once. View quote
Edgar Degas