Mary Cassatt Quotes

Women should be someone and not something.

Acceptance, under someone else's terms, is worse than rejection.

I have touched with a sense of art some people-they felt the love and the life. Can you offer me anything to compare to that joy for an artist?

If painting is no longer needed, it seems a pity that some of us are born into the world with such a passion for line and color.

I am independent! I can live alone and I love to work.

There are two ways for a painter: the broad and easy one or the narrow and hard one.

I think that if you shake the tree, you ought to be around when the fruit falls to pick it up.

There's only one thing in life for a woman; it's to be a mother... A woman artist must be... capable of making primary sacrifices.

The first sight of Degas' pictures was the turning point of my artistic life.

It changed my life. I saw art then as I wanted to see it.

It is as well not to have too great an admiration for your master's work. You will be in less danger of imitating him.

I used to go and flatten my nose against that window and absorb all I could of his art. It changed my life. I saw art then as I wanted to see it.

Sometimes it made him [Degas] furious that he could not find a chink in my armor, and there would be months when we just could not see each other, and then something I painted would bring us together again.

World will suffice for me in the future.

Cezanne is one of the most liberal artists I have ever seen... he grants that everyone may be as honest and as true to nature from their convictions; he doesn't believe that everyone should see alike.

Why do people so love to wander? I think the civilized parts of the world will suffice for me in the future.

At some future time I shall see New York the artist's ground. I think you will create an American School.