Édouard Manet Quotes
–-- Manet to Monet, on Renoir--- “He has no talent at all, that boy! You, who is his friend, tell him, please, to give up painting.” ― Édouard Manet
“There are no lines in nature, only areas of color, one against another.” ― Édouard Manet
“I paint what I see and not what others like to see.” ― Édouard Manet
“One does not paint a landscape, a seascape, a figure. One paints an impression of an hour of the day.” ― Édouard Manet
“It is not enough to know your craft - you have to have felt. Science is all very well, but for us, imagination is worth far more.” ― Édouard Manet
“There is only one true thing: instantly paint what you see. When you've got it, you've got it. When you haven't, you begin again. All the rest is humbug.” ― Édouard Manet
“Above all, keep your colors fresh!” ― Édouard Manet
“You must always remain master of the situation and do what you please. No school tasks, ah, no! no tasks!” ― Édouard Manet
“There is no symmetry in nature. One eye is never exactly the same as the other.” ― Édouard Manet
“No one can be a painter unless he cares for painting above all else.” ― Édouard Manet
“I need to work to feel well.” ― Édouard Manet
“You can deduce everything about a woman from the way she holds her feet. Seductive women always turn their feet out. Don't expect to get anywhere with a woman who turns her feet in.” ― Édouard Manet
“Every new painting is like throwing myself into the water without knowing how to swim.” ― Édouard Manet
“You would hardly believe how difficult it is to place a figure alone on a canvas, and to concentrate all the interest on this single and universal figure and still keep it living and real.” ― Édouard Manet
“In a face, look for the main light and the main shadow; the rest will come naturally — it's often not important. And then you must cultivate your memory because Nature will only provide you with references. Nature is like a warden in a lunatic asylum. It stops you from becoming banal.” ― Édouard Manet
“Conciseness in art is essential and a refinement. The concise man makes one think; the verbose bores. Always work towards conciseness.” ― Édouard Manet
“The latest fashion is absolutely necessary for painting. It's what matters most.” ― Édouard Manet
“The country only has charms for those not obliged to stay there.” ― Édouard Manet
“Who is this Monet whose name sounds just like mine and who is taking advantage of my notoriety?” ― Édouard Manet
“The principal person in a picture is light.” ― Édouard Manet
“One must be of one's time and paint what one sees.” ― Édouard Manet
“Color is a matter of taste and sensitivity.” ― Édouard Manet
“I paint as I feel like painting; to hell with all their studies.” ― Édouard Manet
“I spent a long time, my dear Suzanne, looking for your photograph - I eventually found the album in the table in the drawing-room, so I can look at your comforting face from time to time. I woke up last night thinking I heard you calling me... Every day we're expecting a major offensive to break through the iron ring that surrounds us. We are counting on the provinces because we can't just send our little [French] army to be massacred. Those devious Prussians may well try to starve us out.” ― Édouard Manet
“If I'm lucky, when I paint, first my patrons leave the room, then my dealers, and if I'm really lucky I leave too.” ― Édouard Manet
“Concision in art is a necessity and an elegance. The verbose painter bores: who will get rid of all these trimmings?” ― Édouard Manet
“I would kiss you, had I the courage.” ― Édouard Manet
“Insults are pouring down on me as thick as hail.” ― Édouard Manet
“The attacks of which I have been the object have broken the spring of life in me... People don't realize what it feels like to be constantly insulted.” ― Édouard Manet
Quotes About Édouard Manet
“When our artists give us Venuses, they correct nature, they lie. Manet asked himself why lie, why not tell the truth; he introduced us Olympia, this fille of our time, whom you meet on the sidewalks.” ― Emile Zola
“Like a true Parisien, he [Manet] brings Paris to the country and is incapable of painting a landscape without including well-dressed men and women. He loses interest in nature once it no longer bears the mark of everyday life.” ― Emile Zola
“Manet sees color and light, after which he no longer worries about the rest. When he has made the 'spot of color' on his canvas that a person or an object makes on the surrounding environment, he feels that this is sufficient. Don't ask anything else of him for the moment...His present vice is a sort of pantheism in which a [human] head is esteemed no more than a slipper; in which sometimes more importance is given to a bouquet of flowers, than to the physiognomy of a woman.. ..one scarcely pays attention to the head, although it is full grace.. ..it is lost in the modulation of the coloring.” ― Théophile Thoré-Bürger
“..once started, nothing could stop him; from the skirt, he went to the bust, from the bust to the head, from the head to the background. He cracked a thousand jokes, laughed like a madman, handed me the palette, took it back; finally by five o'clock in the afternoon we had made the best caricature you have ever seen.” ― Berthe Morisot