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The Object, Which Is Back Of Every True Work Of Art, Is The Attainment Of A State Of Being, A State Of High Functioning, A More Than Ordinary Moment Of Existence. In Such Moments Activity Is Inevitable, And Whether This Activity Is With Brush, Pen, Chisel, Or Tongue, Its Result Is But A By-product Of The State, A Trace, The Footprint Of The State.

-Robert Henri

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The Object, Which Is

Robert Henri

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The Object, Which Is Back Of Every True Work Of Art, Is The Attainment Of A State Of Being, A State Of High Functioning, A More Than Ordinary Moment Of Existence. In Such Moments Activity Is Inevitable, And Whether This Activity Is With Brush, Pen, Chisel, Or Tongue, Its Result Is But A By-product Of The State, A Trace, The Footprint Of The State.

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Beauty Is An Intangible Thing; Can Not Be Fixed On The Surface, And The Wear And Tear Of Old Age On The Body Cannot Defeat It. Nor Will A "pretty" Face Make It, For "pretty" Faces Are Often Dull And Empty, And Beauty Is Never Dull And It Fills All Spaces.

The Pernicious Influence Of The Prize And Medal Giving In Art Is So Great That It Should Be Stopped. History Proves That Juries In Art Have Been Generally Wrong.

The Model Is Not To Be Copied, But To Be Realized.

Look For Echoes. Sometimes The Same Shape Or Direction Will Echo Through The Picture.

Work Always As If You Were A Master, Expect From Yourself A Masterpiece.

Art Need Not Be Intended. It Comes Inevitably As The Tree From The Root, The Branch From The Trunk, The Blossom From The Twig. None Of These Forget The Present In Looking Backward Or Forward. They Are Occupied Wholly With The Fulfillment Of Their Own Existence.

Cherish Your Own Emotions And Never Undervalue Them.

Knowing Who You Are

Art Is An Outsider, A Gypsy Over The Face Of The Earth.

All Manifestations Of Art Are But Landmarks In The Progress Of The Human Spirit Toward A Thing But As Yet Sensed And Far From Being Possessed.

Your Painting Is The Marking Of Your Progression Into Nature, A Sensation Of Something You See Way Beyond The Two Pretty Colors Over There. Don't Stop To Paint The Material, But Push On To Give The Spirit.

Life Is Finding Yourself. It Is A Spirit Development.

Finding Yourself

If A Certain Activity, Such As Painting, Becomes The Habitual Mode Of Expression, It May Follow That Taking Up The Painting Materials And Beginning Work With Them Will Act Suggestively And So Presently Evoke A Flight Into The Higher State.

We Make Our Discoveries While In The State [of High Functioning] Because Then We Are Clear-sighted.

Don't Stop To Paint The Material, But Push On To Give The Spirit.

Through Art Mysterious Bonds Of Understanding And Of Knowledge Are Established Among Men.

There Are People Who Buy Pictures Because They Were Difficult To Do, And Are Done. Such Pictures Are Often Only A Record Of Pain And Dull Perseverance. Great Works Of Art Should Look As Though They Were Made In Joy. Real Joy Is A Tremendous Activity, Dull Drudgery Is Nothing To It.

By My Teaching I Hope To Inspire You To Personal Activity And To Present Your Vision.

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.

The Only Sensible Way To Regard The Art Life Is That It Is A Privilege You Are Willing To Pay For... You May Cite Honors And Attentions And Even Money Paid, But I Would Have You Note That These Were Paid A Long Time After The Creator Had Gone Through His Struggles.

All Is As Beautiful As We Think It.

You Will Never Draw The Sense Of A Thing Unless You Are Feeling It At The Time You Work.

A Weak Background Is A Deadly Thing.

It's A Wrong Idea That A Master Is A Finished Person. Masters Are Very Faulty; They Haven't Learned Everything And They Know It.

No Work Of Art Is Really Ever Finished. They Only Stop At Good Places.

It Is Harder To See Than It Is To Express. The Whole Value Of Art Rests In The Artist's Ability To See Well Into What Is Before Him. ... The Model Will Serve Equally For A Rembrandt Drawing Or For Anybody's Magazine Cover. A Genius Is One Who Can See. The Others Can Often 'draw' Remarkably Well. ... Those Who Get Their Technique First, Expecting Sight To Come To Them Later, Get A Technique Of A Very Ready-made Order.

The Picture That Looks As If It Were Done Without An Effort May Have Been A Perfect Battlefield In Its Making.

The Pursuit Of Happiness Is A Great Activity. One Must Be Open And Alive. It Is The Greatest Feat Man Has To Accomplish, And Spirits Must Flow. There Must Be Courage. There Are No Easy Ruts To Get Into Which Lead To Happiness. A Man Must Become Interesting To Himself And Must Become Actually Expressive Before He Can Be Happy.

Pursuit Of Happiness

Art Is, After All, Only A Trace – Like A Footprint Which Shows That One Has Walked Bravely And In Great Happiness.

Art Is The Giving By Each Man Of His Evidence To The World. Those Who Wish To Give, Love To Give, Discover The Pleasure Of Giving. Those Who Give Are Tremendously Strong.

Do Not Worry About Your Originality. You Could Not Get Rid Of It Even If You Wanted To.

Things Should All Be Moving Toward The Expression Of A Great Idea.

You Form A Society: That Limits You. Adopt A Name, And You've Limited Yourself Again; Draw Up A Constitution And Bylaws And You've Made A Groove, A Rut, That Hampers Your Growth. You Think You Can Fix Your Course And Move Straight Along It. But Sometimes The Important Thing Is To Strike Out Sidewise.

All Outward Success, When It Has Value, Is But The Inevitable Result Of An Inward Success Of Full Living, Full Play And Enjoyment Of One's Faculties.

If You Do Not Act On A Suggestion At First, You Grow Dull To Its Message.

Procrastination

The Pictures Which Do Not Represent An Intense Interest Cannot Expect To Create An Intense Interest.

Everything Depends On The Attitude Of The Artist Toward His Subject. It Is Essential.

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.

Art Tends Toward Balance, Order, Judgment Of Relative Values, The Laws Of Growth, The Economy Of Living – Very Good Things For Anyone To Be Interested In.

Colors Are Beautiful When They Are Significant.

If You Think Of A School Drawing While You Work, Your Drawing Will Look Like One.

If The Artist's Will Is Not Strong He Will See All Kinds Of Unessential Things.

A Drawing Should Be A Verdict On The Model. Don't Confuse A Drawing With A Map.

The Object Isn't To Make Art, It's To Be In That Wonderful State Which Makes Art Inevitable.

Personal Experimentation Is Revealing, And Once You Get Into It, Immensely Engaging.

Experimentation

Whatever You Feel Or Think Your Exact State At The Exact Moment Of Your Brush Touching The Canvas Is In Some Way Registered In That Stroke.

Art After All Is But An Extension Of Language To The Expression Of Sensations Too Subtle For Words.

There Are Forms That Can Only Be Seen When You Are Near A Painting, Others Only Appear When You Are Far Away.

When The Artist Is Alive In Any Person, Whatever His Kind Of Work May Be, He Becomes An Inventive, Searching, Daring, Self-expressing Creature.

Art Is Certainly Not A Pursuit For Anyone Who Wants To Make Money.

Those Who Cannot Begin Do Not Finish.

The Artist Should Be Intoxicated With The Idea Of The Thing He Wants To Express.

Art When Really Understood Is The Province Of Every Human Being. It Is Simply A Question Of Doing Things, Anything, Well. It Is Not An Outside, Extra Thing.

After All, The Goal Is Not Making Art. It Is Living A Life. Those Who Live Their Lives Will Leave The Stuff That Is Really Art.

Strokes Carry A Message Whether You Will It Or Not. The Stroke Is Just Like The Artist At The Time He Makes It. All The Certainties, All The Uncertainties, All The Bigness Of His Spirit And The Littlenesses Are In It.

Genius Is Not A Possession Of The Limited Few, But Exists In Some Degree In Everyone. Where There Is Natural Growth, A Full And Free Play Of Faculties, Genius Will Manifest Itself.

Self-acquainta Nce Is A Rare Condition.

All Education Must Be Self-education.

The Work Of The Art Student Is No Light Matter. Few Have The Courage And Stamina To Think It Through. You Have To Make Up Your Mind To Be Alone In Many Ways. We Like Sympathy And We Like To Be In Company. It Is Easier Than Going It Alone. But Alone One Gets Acquainted With Himself, Grows Up And On, Not Stopping With The Crowd. It Costs To Do This. If You Succeed Somewhat You May Have To Pay For It As Well As Enjoy It All Your Life.

Lines Are Results, Do Not Draw Them For Themselves.

Concentrate On A Single Feature - As, Build All Toward One Eye - Make All Lines Lead Toward That Eye.

When The Motives Of Artists Are Profound, When They Are At Their Work As A Result Of Deep Consideration, When They Believe In The Importance Of What They Are Doing, Their Work Creates A Stir In The World.

To Be Free, To Be Happy And To Be Fruitful, Can Only Be Attained Through Sacrifice Of Many Common But Overestimated Things.

Beauty Is No Material Thing. Beauty Cannot Be Copied. Beauty Is The Sensation Of Pleasure On The Mind Of The Seer. No Thing Is Beautiful. But All Things Await The Sensitive And Imaginative Mind That May Be Aroused To Pleasurable Emotion At Sight Of Them. This Is Beauty.

Do Whatever You Do Intensely.

You Can Do Anything You Want To Do. What Is Rare Is This Actual Wanting To Do A Specific Thing: Wanting It So Much That You Are Practically Blind To All Other Things, That Nothing Else Will Satisfy You.

Students Work In Schools Making Life Studies For Years, Win Prizes For Life Studies And Find In The End That They Know Practically Nothing Of The Human Figure. They Have Acquired The Ability To Copy.

What We Need Is More Sense Of The Wonder Of Life And Less Of This Business Of Making A Picture.

The Most Vital Things In The Look Of A Landscape Endure Only For A Moment. Work Should Be Done From Memory; Memory Of That Vital Moment.

Why Do We Love The Sea? It Is Because It Has Some Potent Power To Make Us Think Things We Like To Think.

Artists Must Be Men Of Wit, Consciously Or Unconsciously Philosophers; Read, Study And Think A Great Deal Of Life.

The Real Artist's Work Is A Surprise To Himself.

Let Every Student Enter The School With This Advice. No Matter How Good The School Is, His Education Is In His Own Hands. All Education Must Be Self Education.

There Are Mighty Few People Who Think What They Think They Think.

Drawing Is Not Following A Line On The Model, It Is Drawing Your Sense Of The Thing.

In A Tree There Is A Spirit Of Life, A Spirit Of Growth And A Spirit Of Holding Its Head Up.

Paint The Flying Spirit Of The Bird Rather Than Its Feathers.

The Reason For The Survival Of The Award System Is Purely Commercial.

Painting Should Never Look As If It Were Done With Difficulty, However Difficult It May Actually Have Been.

Your Only Hope Of Satisfying Others Is In Satisfying Yourself. I Speak Of A Great Satisfaction, Not A Commercial Satisfaction.

Don't Worry About Your Originality. You Couldn't Get Rid Of It Even If You Wanted To. It Will Stick With You And Show Up For Better Or Worse In Spite Of All You Or Anyone Else Can Do.

Get The Few Main Lines And See What Lines They Call Out.

A Curve Does Not Exist In Its Full Power Until Contrasted With A Straight Line.

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 Weakness In Pretending To Know More Than You Know Or In Stating Less Than You Know.

Your Style Is The Way You Talk In Paint.

Keep A Bad Drawing Until By Study You Have Found Out Why It Is Bad.

The World Will See Many Fashions Of Art And Most Of The World Will Follow The Fashions And Make None. These Cults - These 'movements' - Are Absolutely Necessary, Or At Any Rate Their Causes Are, For Somewhere In Their Centres Are The Ones Who Bear The Idea, The Ones Who Have Questioned, 'but What Do I Think?' And 'how Shall I Say It Best?

You Pass People On The Street, Some Are For You, Some Are Not.

Self-education Only Produces Expressions Of Self.

Each Man Must Take The Material That He Finds At Hand, See That In It There Are The Big Truths Of Life, The Fundamentally Big Forces, And Then Express In His Art Whatever Is The Cause Of His Pleasure.

Through Art, Mysterious Bonds Of Understanding And Of Knowledge Are Established Among Men. They Are The Bonds Of A Great Brotherhood. Those Who Are Of The Brotherhood Know Each Other, And Time And Space Cannot Separate Them.

Good Composition Is Like A Suspension Bridge - Each Line Adds Strength And Takes None Away.

A Picture Should Be The Expression Of The Will Of The Painter.

I Am Always Sorry For The Puritan, For He Guided His Life Against Desire And Against Nature. He Found What He Thought Was Comfort, For He Believed The Spirit's Safety Was In Negation, But He Has Never Given The World One Minute's Joy Or Produced One Symbol Of The Beautiful Order Of Nature. He Sought Peace In Bondage And His Spirit Became A Prisoner.

There Are Pictures That Manifest Education And There Are Pictures That Manifest Love.

I Can Think Of No Greater Happiness Than To Be Clear-sighted And Know The Miracle When It Happens. And I Can Think Of No More Real Life Than The Adventurous One Of Living And Liking And Exclaiming The Things Of One's Own Time.

I Am Interested In Art As A Means Of Living A Life; Not As A Means Of Making A Living.

In Certain Books—some Way In The First Few Paragraphs You Know That You Have Met A Brother.

Has Your Drawing The Meaning You Saw In The Model At First?

Manet Did Not Do The Expected. He Was A Pioneer. He Followed His Individual Whim. Told The Public What He Wanted It To Know, Not The Time Worn Things The Public Already Knew And Thought It Wanted To Hear Again. The Public Was Very Much Offended.

Pretend You Are Dancing Or Singing A Picture. A Worker Or Painter Should Enjoy His Work, Else The Observer Will Not Enjoy It.

It Is Harder To See Than It Is To Express. The Whole Value Of Art Rests In The Artist's Ability To See Well Into What Is Before Him.

There Is Nothing In All The World More Beautiful Or Significant Of The Laws Of The Universe Than The Nude Human Body.

Many Receive A Criticism And Think It Is Fine; Think They Got Their Money's Worth; Think Well Of The Teacher For It, And Then Go On With Their Work Just The Same As Before. That Is The Reason Much Of The Wisdom Of Plato Is Still Locked Up In The Pages Of Plato.

Be A Warhorse For Work And Enjoy Even The Struggle Against Defeat.

Pretend You Are Dancing Or Singing A Picture.

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?

If You Work From Memory, You Are Most Likely To Put In Your Real Feeling.

Don't Worry About The Rejections. Everybody That's Good Has Gone Through It. Don't Let It Matter If Your Works Are Not "accepted" At Once. The Better Or More Personal You Are The Less Likely They Are Of Acceptance.

To Have Ideas One Must Have Imagination. To Express Ideas One Must Have Science.

Color Is Only Beautiful When It Means Something.

There Are Moments In Our Lives, There Are Moments In A Day, When We Seem To See Beyond The Usual. Such Are The Moments Of Our Greatest Happiness. Such Are The Moments Of Our Greatest Wisdom.

Each Sensation Is Precious, Protect It, Cherish It, Keep It. Never Give It Away. You Must Develop That Balance Which Allows All Of The World To Come In To You, And Only That Which You Have Expressed In Your Art To Move Back Out Again Into The World.

It Is The Common Defect Of Modern Art Study. Too Many Students Do Not Know Why They Draw.

A Great Painter Will Know A Great Deal About How He Did It, But Still He Will Say, “how Did I Do It?

Today Must Not Be A Souvenir Of Yesterday, And So The Struggle Is Everlasting. Who Am I Today? What Do I See Today? How Shall I Use What I Know, And How Shall I Avoid Being Victim Of What I Know? Life Is Not Repetition.

When The Artist Is Alive In Any Person, Whatever His Kind Of Work May Be, He Becomes An Inventive, Searching, Daring, Self-expressive Creature. He Becomes Interesting To Other People. He Disturbs, Upsets, Enlightens, And Opens Ways For Better Understanding. Where Those Who Are Not Artists Are Trying To Close The Book, He Opens It And Shows There Are Still More Pages Possible.

There Is Nothing More Entertaining Than To Have A Frank Talk With Yourself. Few Do It-frankly. Educating Yourself Is Getting Acquainted With Yourself.

Educating Yourself

Good Composition Is Like A Suspension Bridge; Each Line Adds Strength And Takes None Away... Making Lines Run Into Each Other Is Not Composition. There Must Be Motive For The Connection. Get The Art Of Controlling The Observer – That Is Composition.

The Man Who Has Honesty, Integrity, The Love Of Inquiry, The Desire To See Beyond, Is Ready To Appreciate Good Art.

An Artist Must First Of All Respond To His Subject, He Must Be Filled With Emotion Toward That Subject And Then He Must Make His Technique So Sincere, So Translucent That It May Be Forgotten, The Value Of The Subject Shining Through It.

Count On Big Lines To Express Your Ideas.

Do Not Let The Fact That Things Are Not Made For You, That Conditions Are Not As They Should Be Stop You. Go On Anyway. Everything Depends On Those Who Go On Anyway.

Finished Persons Are Very Common - People Who Are Closed Up, Quite Satisfied That There Is Little More To Learn

Renoir Had Not Only A Great Interest In Human Character, In Human Feeling, But Had Also A Great Love For The People He Painted.

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.

Realize That A Drawing Is Not A Copy. It Is A Construction In Very Different Materials. A Drawing Is An Invention.

Feel The Dignity Of A Child. Do Not Feel Superior To Him, For You Are Not.

The Fun Of Living Is That We Have To Make Ourselves, After All.

There Has Never Been A Painting That Was More Beautiful Than Nature. The Model Does Not Unfold Herself To You, You Must Rise To Her. She Should Be The Inspiration For Your Painting. No Man Has Ever Over-appreciated A Human Being.

The Object, Which Is Back Of Every True Work Of Art, Is The Attainment Of A State Of Being, A State Of High Functioning, A More Than Ordinary Moment Of Existence. In Such Moments Activity Is Inevitable, And Whether This Activity Is With Brush, Pen, Chisel, Or Tongue, Its Result Is But A By-product Of The State, A Trace, The Footprint Of The State.

Art Appreciation, Like Love, Cannot Be Done By Proxy: It Is A Very Personal Affair And Is Necessary To Each Individual.

Knowledge Of Anatomy Is A Tool Like Good Brushes.

In Great Art There Is No Beginning And End In Point Of Time. All Time Is Comprehended.

Beginnings And Ends

The Pursuit Of Happiness Is A Great Activity. One Must Be Open And Alive. It Is The Greatest Feat Man Has To Accomplish, And Spirits Must Flow. There Must Be Courage. There Are No Easy Ruts To Get Into Which Lead To Happiness.

There Is No Art Without Contemplation.

The Man Who Has Honesty, Integrity, The Love Of Inquiry, The Desire To See Beyond, Is Ready To Appreciate Good Art. He Needs No One To Give Him An 'art Education'; He Is Already Qualified. He Needs But To See Pictures With His Active Mind, Look Into Them For The Things That Belong To Him, And He Will Find Soon Enough In Himself An Art Connoisseur And An Art Lover Of The First Order.

The Good Thing About Painting From Memory Is That So Much Is Forgotten.

The Artist Should Have A Powerful Will. He Should Be Powerfully Possessed By One Idea

Fight With Yourself When You Paint, Not With The Model. A Student Is One Who Struggles With Himself For Order.

To Paint Is To Know How To Put Nothing On Canvas, And Have It Look Like Something When You Stand Back.

When We Respect The Nude, We Will No Longer Have Any Shame About It.

We Are Not Here To Do What Has Already Been Done.

Inspirational Life

Find Out What You Really Like If You Can. Find Out What Is Really Important To You. Then Sing Your Song. You Will Have Something To Sing About And Your Whole Heart Will Be In The Singing.

Perhaps Whatever There Is In My Work That May Be Really Interesting To Others And Surely What Is Interesting To Me, Is The Result Of A Sometimes Successful Effort To Free Myself From Any Idea That What I Produce Must Be Art.

Completion Does Not Depend On Material Representation. The Work Is Done When That Special Thing Has Been Said.

Develop Your Visual Memory. Draw Everything You Have Drawn From The Model From Memory As Well.

The True Artist Regards His Work As A Means Of Talking With Men [and Women], Of Saying His Say To Himself And To Others. It Is Not A Question Of Pay.

There Are Moments In Our Lives, There Are Moments In A Day, When We Seem To See Beyond The Usual- Become Clairvoyant. We Reach Then Into Reality. Such Are The Moments Of Our Greatest Happiness. Such Are The Moments Of Our Greatest Wisdom. It Is In The Nature Of All People To Have These Experiences; But In Our Time And Under The Conditions Of Our Lives, It Is Only A Rare Few Who Are Able To Continue In The Experience And Find Expression For It.

I Am Interested In The Size Of Your Intention. It Is Better To Overstate The Important Than To Understate It.

It Seems To Me That Before A Man Tries To Express Anything To The World He Must Recognize In Himself An Individual, A New One, Very Distinct From Others.

All The Past Up To A Moment Ago Is Your Legacy. You Have A Right To It.

Art Appreciation, Like Love, Cannot Be Done By Proxy.

The Ignorant Are To Be Found As Much Among The Educated As Among The Uneducated.

I Have Heard It Very Often Said That An Artist Does Not Need Intelligence, That His Is The Province Of The Soul

The More Simply You See, The More Simply You Will Render. People See Too Much, Scatteringly.

Paint Like A Fiend When The Idea Possesses You.

An Artist Must Have Imagination. An Artist Who Does Not Use His Imagination Is A Mechanic.

A Mountain Seen In The Haze Of Distance Must Nevertheless Look A Solid Heavy Mountain.

There Is Only One Reason For Art In America, And That Is That The People Of America Learn The Means Of Expressing Themselves In Their Own Time, And Their Own Land.

Educate Yourself. Don't Let Me Educate You

I Paint For The Sole Purpose Of Magnifying The Privilege Of Being Alive.

Paint What You Feel. Paint What You See. Paint What Is Real To You.

Art Cannot Be Separated From Life. It Is The Expression Of The Greatest Need Of Which Life Is Capable, And We Value Art Not Because Of The Skilled Product, But Because Of Its Revelation Of A Life's Experience.

Reality Is Obtained Not By Imitation, But By Producing The Sense Of Nature.

An Artist's Job Is To Surprise Himself. Use All Means Possible.

All Real Works Of Art Look As Though They Were Done In Joy.

Do Not Expect Pictures To Say The Expected; Some Of The Best Will Have Surprises For You, Which Will, At First, Shock You.

Do Whatever You Do Intensely. The Artist Is The Man Who Leaves The Crowd And Goes Pioneering. With Him There Is An Idea Which Is His Life.

Many Things That Come Into The World Are Not Looked Into. The Individual Says 'my Crowd Doesn't Run That Way.' I Say, Don't Run With Crowds.

The Big Painter Is One Who Has Something To Say. He Thus Does Not Paint Men, Landscape Or Furniture, But An Idea.

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