Henry Moore Quotes

In my opinion, everything, every shape, every bit of natural form, animals, people, pebbles, shells, anything you like are all things that can help you to make a sculpture.

Abstraction means getting away from a visual interpretation but nearer to an emotional one.

Art is the expression of imagination, not the reproduction of reality.

If I set out to sculpt a standing man and it becomes a lying woman, I know I am making art.

To be an artist is to believe in life.

I would like my work to be thought of as a celebration of life and nature.

The secret of life is to have a task, something you devote your entire life to, something you bring everything to, every minute of the day for the rest of your life. And the most important thing is, it must be something you cannot possibly do.

The soul cannot thrive in the absence of art.

All art should have a certain mystery and should make demands on the spectator. Giving a sculpture or a drawing too explicit a title takes away part of that mystery so that the spectator moves on to the next object, making no effort to ponder the meaning of what he has just seen. Everyone thinks that he or she looks but they don't really, you know.

One never knows what each day is going to bring. The important thing is to be open and ready for it.

The whole of nature is an endless demonstration of shape and form. It always surprises me when artists try to escape from this.

Between beauty of expression and power of expression there is a difference of function. The first aims at pleasing the senses, the second has a spiritual vitality which for me is more moving and goes deeper than the senses.

I find in all the artists that I admire most a disturbing element, a distortion, giving evidence of a struggle . . . . In great art, this conflict is hidden, it is unresolved. All that is bursting with energy is disturbing - not perfect.

The important thing is somehow to begin.

Art is not to do with the practical side of making a living. It's to live a fuller human life.

Being an artist is celebrating life.

The creative habit is like a drug. The particular obsession changes, but the excitement, the thrill of your creation lasts.

I think in terms of the day's resolutions, not the years'.

I have always liked drawing, when you draw you see things more intensely.

Art is a continuous activity with no separation between past and present.

To know one thing, you must know the opposite.

Painting and sculpture help other people to see what a wonderful world we live in.

Sculpture is an art of the open air... I would rather have a piece of my sculpture put in a landscape, almost any landscape, than in, or on, the most beautiful building I know.

I think, what has this day brought me, and what have I given it?

I don't know of any good work of art that doesn't have a mystery.