Art Marketing

Be Inspired by These 40 Brilliant Quotes from Famous Artists

As an artist, it’s easy to get caught up in the daily grind of creating and forget about the bigger picture. From Michelangelo to Banksy, the quotes of artists have the power to motivate us, challenge us, and encourage us to embrace our creativity.

Here are 40 brilliant quotes from famous fine artists, photographers, and sculptors throughout history that are sure to inspire you:

  1. “The painter has the Universe in his mind and hands.” – Leonardo da Vinci
  2. “Art is not what you see, but what you make others see.” – Edgar Degas
  3. “I am seeking. I am striving. I am in it with all my heart.” – Vincent van Gogh
  4. “I paint objects as I think of them, not as I see them.” – Pablo Picasso
  5. “You don’t take a photograph, you make it.” – Ansel Adams
  6. “They say human eyes are the mirror of the soul, and I used to draw them too carelessly. Say, to express the anger, I just drew some triangular eyes. I drew obviously-angry eyes, projected my anger there, and somehow released my pent-up emotions. About ten years ago, however, I became more interested in expressing complex feelings in a more complex way. I began to stop and think, to take a breath before letting everything out.” – Yoshitomo Nara
  7. “The true work of art is but a shadow of the divine perfection.” – Michelangelo 
  8. “I dream my painting and I paint my dream.” – Vincent van Gogh
  9. “Color is my day-long obsession, joy, and torment.” – Claude Monet
  10. “The only thing I know is that I paint because I need to, and I paint whatever passes through my head without any other consideration.” – Frida Kahlo
  11. “Photography is a way of feeling, of touching, of loving. What you have caught on film is captured forever… it remembers little things, long after you have forgotten everything.” – Aaron Siskind
  12. “To create one’s world in any of the arts takes courage.” – Georgia O’Keeffe
  13. “Art is the lie that enables us to realize the truth.” – Pablo Picasso
  14. “Every artist was first an amateur.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
  15. “I paint self-portraits because I am so often alone, because I am the person I know best.” – Frida Kahlo
  16. “The more I paint the more I like everything.” – Jean-Michel Basquiat 
  17. “When I say I want to photograph someone, what it really means is that I’d like to know them. Anyone I know I photograph.” – Annie Leibovitz 
  18. “The purpose of art is to make the invisible visible.” – Paul Klee
  19. “Don’t think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it’s good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art.” – Andy Warhol 
  20. “Art is a harmony parallel with nature.” – Paul Cezanne
  21. “The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery.” – Francis Bacon
  22. “The artist is a receptacle for emotions that come from all over the place: from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider’s web.” – Pablo Picasso
  23. “Art is the queen of all sciences communicating knowledge to all the generations of the world.” – Leonardo da Vinci
  24. “Painting is self-discovery. Every good artist paints what he is.” – Jackson Pollock
  25. “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
  26. “I just want to make the world a better-looking place. If you don’t like it, you can paint over it!” – Banksy 
  27. “Photography is an art of observation. It has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.” – Elliott Erwitt
  28. “A great photograph is a full expression of what one feels about what is being photographed in the deepest sense and is, thereby, a true expression of what one feels about life in its entirety.” – Ansel Adams
  29. “What makes photography a strange invention is that its primary raw materials are light and time.” – John Berger
  30. “Photography is a love affair with life.” – Burk Uzzle
  31. “Painting is easy when you don’t know how, but very difficult when you do.” – Edgar Degas
  32. “Great art picks up where nature ends.” – Marc Chagall
  33. “Creativity takes courage.” – Henri Matisse
  34. “Art is the highest form of hope.” – Gerhard Richter
  35. “My goal is never to copy. Create a new style.” – Tamara de Lempicka
  36. “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.” – Pablo Picasso
  37. “There is no abstract art. You must always start with something. Afterward, you can remove all traces of reality.” – Pablo Picasso
  38. “The artist’s job is to be a witness to his time in history.” – Robert Rauschenberg
  39. “To be an artist is to believe in life.” – Henry Moore
  40. “Art is the magic mirror that we create to turn invisible dreams into visible pictures.” – Ernst Haas

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