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Leon Battista Alberti Quotes - Page 2

All Quotes Art Painting
Perhaps the artist who seeks dignity above all in his 'historia', ought to represent very few figures; for as paucity of words imparts majesty to a prince, provided histhoughts and orders are understood, so the presence

Perhaps the artist who seeks dignity above all in his 'historia', ought to represent very few figures; for as paucity of words imparts majesty to a prince, provided histhoughts and orders are understood, so the presence of only the strictly necessary numbers of bodies confers dignity on a picture.

Leon Battista Alberti
Artist, Order, Numbers
1436 On Painting (translated by Cecil Grayson).

The picture will have charm when each color is very unlike the one next to it.

Leon Battista Alberti
Color, Next, Charm

Buildings have been made because of man.

Leon Battista Alberti
Men, Building, Made

Painting is possessed of divine power, for not only does it make the absent present, but also makes the dead almost alive.

Leon Battista Alberti
Doe, Alive, Divine Power

I shall praise those faces which seem to project out of the picture as though they were sculptured, and I shall censure those faces in which I see no art but that of outline.

Leon Battista Alberti
Art, Portraiture, Faces

I prefer you to take as your model a mediocre sculpture rather than an excellent painting, for from painted objects we train our hand only to make a likeness, whereas from sculptures we learn to represent both likeness and correct incidence of light.

Leon Battista Alberti
Light, Hands, Sculpture
1436 On Painting (translated by Cecil Grayson).

What is painting but the act of embracing, by means of art, the surface of the pool?

Leon Battista Alberti
Art, Mean, Painting
Leon Battista Alberti, Cecil Grayson (1972). “On painting and On sculpture: The Latin texts of De pictura and De statua”

I will never tire of recommending the custom, practiced by the best architects, of preparing not only drawings and sketches, but also models of wood or any other material. These... enable us to examine... the work as a whole... and, before continuing any further, to estimate the likely trouble and expense.

Leon Battista Alberti
Drawing, Woods, Trouble

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