Robert Henri Quotes - Page 6

Count on big lines to express your ideas.

If you do not act on a suggestion at first, you grow dull to its message.

A mountain seen in the haze of distance must nevertheless look a solid heavy mountain.

Do not expect pictures to say the expected; some of the best will have surprises for you, which will, at first, shock you.

There are people who buy pictures because they were difficult to do, and are done. Such pictures are often only a record of pain and dull perseverance. Great works of art should look as though they were made in joy. Real joy is a tremendous activity, dull drudgery is nothing to it.

Art is certainly not a pursuit for anyone who wants to make money.

If you work from memory, you are most likely to put in your real feeling.

Has your drawing the meaning you saw in the model at first?

The model is not to be copied, but to be realized.

Because we are saturated with life, because we are human, our strongest motive is life, humanity; and the stronger the motive back of the line the stronger, and therefore more beautiful, the line will be.

It is harder to see than it is to express. The whole value of art rests in the artist's ability to see well into what is before him. ... The model will serve equally for a Rembrandt drawing or for anybody's magazine cover. A genius is one who can see. The others can often 'draw' remarkably well. ... Those who get their technique first, expecting sight to come to them later, get a technique of a very ready-made order.

Realize that a drawing is not a copy. It is a construction in very different materials. A drawing is an invention.

I am interested in the size of your intention. It is better to overstate the important than to understate it.

By my teaching I hope to inspire you to personal activity and to present your vision.

There is nothing in all the world more beautiful or significant of the laws of the universe than the nude human body.

If you think of a school drawing while you work, your drawing will look like one.

Things should all be moving toward the expression of a great idea.

Manet did not do the expected. He was a pioneer. He followed his individual whim. Told the public what he wanted it to know, not the time worn things the public already knew and thought it wanted to hear again. The public was very much offended.

Educate yourself. Don't let me educate you

Self-education only produces expressions of self.

There are forms that can only be seen when you are near a painting, others only appear when you are far away.

Whatever you feel or think your exact state at the exact moment of your brush touching the canvas is in some way registered in that stroke.

Feel the dignity of a child. Do not feel superior to him, for you are not.

Genius is not a possession of the limited few, but exists in some degree in everyone. Where there is natural growth, a full and free play of faculties, genius will manifest itself.

Art is the giving by each man of his evidence to the world. Those who wish to give, love to give, discover the pleasure of giving. Those who give are tremendously strong.