Robert Henri

“A common defect of modern art study is that too many students do not know why they draw.”

“In every human being there is the artist, and whatever his activity, he has an equal chance with any to express the result of his growth and his contact with life. I don't believe any real artist cares whether what he does is 'art' or not. Who, after all, knows what art is?”

“I have no sympathy with the belief that art is the restricted province of those who paint, sculpt, make music and verse. I hope we will come to an understanding that the material used is only incidental, that there is artist in every man; and that to him the possibility of development and of expression and the happiness of creation is as much a right and as much a duty to himself, as to any of those who work in the especially ticketed ways.”

“Why do we love the sea? It is because it has some potent power to make us think things we like to think.”

“You pass people on the street, some are for you, some are not.”

“It will stick with you and show up for better or worse in spite of all you or anyone else can do.”

“A Curve does not exist in its full power until contrasted with a straight line.”

“Know what the old masters did. Know how they composed their pictures, but do not fall into the conventions they established. These conventions were right for them, and they are wonderful. They made their language. You make yours. All the past can help you.”

“Art is, after all, only a trace – like a footprint which shows that one has walked bravely and in great happiness.”

“The sketch hunter moves through life as he finds it, not passing negligently the things he loves, but stopping to know them, and to note them down in the shorthand of his sketchbook.”

“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.”

“There is no art without contemplation.”

“An artist must have imagination. An artist who does not use his imagination is a mechanic.”

“The end will be what it will be. The object is intense living, fulfillment; the great happiness in creation.”

“The object isn't to make art, it's to be in that wonderful state which makes art inevitable.”

“A tree growing out of the ground is as wonderful today as it ever was. It does not need to adopt new and startling methods.”