Auguste Rodin
Father of modern sculpture, The Thinker
Most quoted
"The artist must be a seer, a visionary, a poet, a dreamer, a philosopher, a scientist, a craftsman, a worker, a man of the world, a man of solitude, a man of action, a man of contemplation, a man of passion, a man of reason, a man of faith, a man of doubt, a man of joy, a man of sorrow, a man of life, a man of death."
— from Various writings
"The artist is the confidant of nature, flowers carry on dialogues with him through the graceful bending of their stems and the harmoniously tinted nuances of their blossoms. Every flower has a cordial word which nature directs towards him."
— from Art, 1911
"It is a mistake to think that the art of the Greeks depended on the beauty of the human form. What they sought was the expression of the soul, and this is to be found in the ugliness of a Silenus as well as in the beauty of a Bacchus."
— from Art, 1911
All quotes by Auguste Rodin (358)
In art, immorality cannot exist. Art is always sacred.
To the artist there is never anything ugly in nature. No, ugliness does not exist; I declare that for my part I am unable to discover it.
The most sublime mission of an artist is to portray man in all his truth.
Art is nothing without form.
The artist must learn the difference between the appearance of an object and the interpretation of this object through his medium.
My liberation came when I realized that the human body is not a thing but a process.
The artist must be sincere. He must not impose a lie upon himself.
The portrait bust is the biography of a head.
I have a horror of the 'finished' in sculpture. The true work of art always appears as though it were a living being.
I am like a man running after a hat in a high wind; the faster I run, the faster it flies before me.
The world is full of artists, but there are very few real workers.
I have been accused of being a revolutionist. I am not. I am a classicist.
The essential thing is to create passionately.
If you are a sculptor, you must feel the form with your fingers as well as with your eyes.
The only thing I know is that I know nothing. That is the beginning of wisdom.
Art is a kind of religion; its priests must be fanatics.
The most beautiful curves are those of the living body in action.
I am not a dreamer, but a mathematician. The sculpture is a problem of volumes.
Contemporaries of Auguste Rodin
Other Visual Artss born within 50 years of Auguste Rodin (1840–1917).