A painting in an interior spreads joy around it by the colors, which calm us. — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
When I paint green, it doesn't mean grass; when I paint blue, it doesn't mean sky. — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
Drawing is like making an expressive gesture with the advantage of permanence. — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
Art should be something like a good armchair in which to rest from physical fatigue. — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
Creation is the artist's true function; where there is no creation there is no art. — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
Much of the beauty that arises in art comes from the struggle an artist wages with his limited medium. — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
The artist has to look at life as he did when he was a child. If he loses that faculty, he cannot… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
There is nothing more difficult for a truly creative painter than to paint a rose, because before he can do so he… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
Hatred, rancor, and the spirit of vengeance are useless baggage to the artist. His road is difficult enough for him to cleanse… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
Expression is not a matter of passion mirrored on the human face or revealed by a violent gesture. When I paint a… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
The effort to see things without distortion takes something like courage and this courage is essential to the artist, who has to… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
A new painting is a unique event, a birth, which enriches the universe as it is grasped by the human mind, by… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
You want to paint? First of all you must cut off your tongue because your decision takes away from you the right… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
An artist who wants to transpose a composition onto a larger canvas must conceive it over again in order to preserve its… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
It is my dream to create an art which is filled with balance, purity and calmness, freed from a subject matter that… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
The essential thing is to spring forth, to express the bolt of lightning one senses upon contact with a thing. The function… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
Each work of art is a collection of signs invented during the picture's execution to suit the needs of their position. Taken… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
When a painting is finished, it's like a new born child, and the artist himself must have time for understanding. How then… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
What's so astonishing about not understanding? There are so many things in art, beginning with art itself, that one doesn't understand. A… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
The role of the artist, like that of the scholar, consists of seizing current truths often repeated to him, but which will… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
It would be a mistake to ascribe this creative power to an inborn talent. In art, the genius creator is not just… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
The artist begins with a vision - a creative operation requiring an effort. — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
Above all, an artist must never be too easily satisfied with what he has done... — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
A colourist makes his presence known even in a simple charcoal drawing. — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
I do not literally paint that table, but the emotion it produces upon me. — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
A work should contain its total meaning within itself and should impress it on the spectator before he even knows the subject. — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
Time extracts various values from a painter's work. When these values are exhausted the pictures are forgotten, and the more a picture… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
Truth and reality in art do not arise until you no longer understand what you are doing and are capable of but… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
Put a colour upon a canvas - it not only colours with that colour the part of the canvas to which the… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
Color helps to express light, not the physical phenomenon, but the only light that really exists, that in the artist's brain. — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
The artists must see all things as if he were seeing them for the first time. All his life he must see… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
A young painter who cannot liberate himself from the influence of past generations is digging his own grave. — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
An artist must never be a prisoner. Prisoner? An artist should never be a prisoner of himself, prisoner of style, prisoner of… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
There is no interruption between my older paintings and my cutouts. Just that with an increasing sense of the absolute, and more… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
The importance of an artist is to be measured by the quantity of new signs which he has introduced to the language… — Henri Matisse Copy Share Image
When I saw what a mess everything was in I asked for my money back on the ticket. I would have felt I was… — Henri Matisse Copy Share
A painting in an interior spreads joy around it by the colors, which calm us. — Henri Matisse Copy Share
Color was not given to us in order that we should imitate Nature. It was given to us so that we can express our… — Henri Matisse Copy Share
If it is practiced by a man of taste, the photograph will have the appearance of art (but) the photographer must...intervene as little as… — Henri Matisse Copy Share
I have always tried to hide my efforts and wished my works to have a light joyousness of springtime which never lets anyone suspect… — Henri Matisse Copy Share
The chief function of color should be to serve expression as well as possible. — Henri Matisse Copy Share
My pictures are made up of four or five colors that collide with one another… — Henri Matisse Copy Share
...I am driven on by an idea that I really only grasp as it grows with the picture. — Henri Matisse Copy Share
