Claude Monet
Founder of Impressionism, Water Lilies
Most quoted
"Try to forget what objects you have before you – a tree, a house, a field, or whatever. Merely think, here is a little square of blue, here an oblong of pink, here a streak of yellow, and paint it just as it looks to you."
— from Advice to Lilla Cabot Perry
"For me, a landscape does not exist in its own right, since its appearance changes at every moment; but the surrounding atmosphere brings it to life – the light and the air which vary continually."
— from Interview, 1890
"I am working at a furious pace. I am afraid of the sun, afraid of the wind, afraid of the clouds, afraid of the rain, afraid of the fog, afraid of the frost, afraid of the snow."
— from Monet's letters
All quotes by Claude Monet (341)
Colors speak all languages.
My eyes are my greatest treasure.
Impressionism is the newspaper of the soul.
I paint to forget the troubles of life.
The water lilies are my eternal companions.
Every morning, I discover a new world in my garden.
To paint is to dream with colors.
I chase the light like a lover.
Nature never deceives us; it is we who deceive ourselves.
My last words? Keep painting the light.
Critics? They understand nothing of the soul's vision.
I laugh at those who call me mad; my madness is genius.
The richness I achieve comes from nature, the source of my inspiration.
I want to paint the air in which the bridge, the house, and the boat are to be found.
My only merit is to have painted directly in front of nature, seeking to convey my impressions in front of the most fugitive effects.
I am following nature without being able to grasp her... I perhaps owe having become a painter to flowers.
I'm not a man of letters, and I'm not a philosopher, I'm a painter.
I have never had a studio, and I believe that painting in a studio is not painting.
I am working hard and I am struggling with nature, and I am not giving up.
The point is to know how to look, and to paint what you see, not what you know.
Contemporaries of Claude Monet
Other Visual Artss born within 50 years of Claude Monet (1840–1926).