Auguste Rodin Quotes

The more simple we are, the more complete we become.

The human body is first and foremost a mirror to the soul and its greatest beauty comes from that.

The artist must create a spark before he can make a fire and before art is born, the artist must be ready to be consumed by the fire of his own creation.

In short, Beauty is everywhere. It is not that she is lacking to our eye, but our eyes which fail to perceive her. Beauty is character and expression. Well, there is nothing in nature which has more character than the human body. In its strength and its grace it evokes the most varied images. One moment it resembles a flower: the bending torso is the stalk; the breasts, the head, and the splendor of the hair answer to the blossoming of the corolla. The next moment it recalls the pliant creeper, or the proud and upright sapling.

The main thing is to be moved, to love, to hope, to tremble, to live. Be a man before being an artist!

Nothing is a waste of time if you use the experience wisely.

The work of art is already within the block of marble. I just chop off whatever isn't needed.

Love your calling with passion, it is the meaning of your life.

Art is the pleasure of a spirit that enters nature and discovers that it too has a soul.

Patience is also a form of action.

Where shall we begin? There is no beginning. Start where you arrive. Stop before what entices you. And work! You will enter little by little into the entirety. Method will be born in proportion to your interest.

Art is contemplation. It is the pleasure of the mind which searches into nature and which there divines the spirit of which nature herself is animated.

Where did I learn to understand sculpture? In the woods by looking at the trees, along roads by observing the formation of clouds, in the studio by studying the model, everywhere except in the schools.

The artist enriches the soul of humanity. The artist delights people with a thousand different shades of feeling.

There is nothing ugly in art except that which is without character, that is to say, that which offers no outer or inner truth.

There is no need to create. Genius comes only to those who know how to use their eyes and their intelligence.

I invent nothing, I rediscover.

Sculpture is the art of the hole and the lump.

People say I think too much about women, yet, after all what is there more important to think about?

One must work, nothing but work, and one must have patience.

There are unknown forces in nature; when we give ourselves wholly to her, without reserve, she lends them to us; she shows us these forms, which our watching eyes do not see, which our intelligence does not understand or suspect.

True artists are almost the only men who do their work for pleasure.

If the artist only reproduces superficial features as photography does, if he copies the lineaments of a face exactly, without reference to character, he deserves no admiration. The resemblance which he ought to obtain is that of the soul.

Man enjoys living on the edge of his dreams and neglects the real things of the world which are so beautiful. The ignorant and indifferent destroy beautiful things merely by looking at the marble. Things that remake the soul of him who understands them.

I grant you that the artist does not see Nature as she appears to the vulgar, because his emotion reveals to him the hidden truths beneath appearances.