Quotes about Creativity

I want to reach that state of condensation of sensations which constitutes a picture.

It is only after years of preparation that the young artist should touch color - not color used descriptively, that is, but as a means of personal expression.

What interests me most is neither still life nor landscape, but the human figure. It is through it that I best succeed in expressing the almost religious feeling I have towards life.

Don't wait for inspiration. It comes while one is working.

Impressionism is the newspaper of the soul

Don't wait for inspiration. It comes while working.

Si je crois en Dieu? Oui, quand je travaille. Quand je suis soumis et modeste, je me sens tellement aidé par quelqu'un qui me fait faire des choses qui me surpassent.

The essential thing is to spring forth, to express the bolt of lightning one senses upon contact with a thing. The function of the artist is not to translate an observation but to express the shock of the object on his nature; the shock, with the original reaction.

My life has been the poem I would have writ, But I could not both live and utter it.

The world is but a canvas to the imagination.

An idea is not necessarily good because it is old, or necessarily bad because it is new, but if an old idea works, then the weight of the evidence is all in its favor. Ideas are of themselves extraordinarily valuable, but an idea is just an idea. Almost any one can think up an idea. The thing that counts is developing it into a practical product.

The soul without imagination is what an observatory would be without a telescope.