Artist Quotes by Michelangelo

Draw, Antonio; draw, Antonio; draw and don’t waste time.

— Michelangelo

True art is made noble and religious by the mind producing it.

— Michelangelo

A great sculpture can roll down a hill without breaking.

— Michelangelo

The more the marble wastes, The more the statue grows.

— Michelangelo

Sculpture is made by taking away, while painting is made by adding.

— Michelangelo

I cannot live under pressures from patrons, let alone paint.

— Michelangelo

Art is a jealous thing; it requires the whole and entire man.

— Michelangelo

Good painting is the kind that looks like sculpture.

— Michelangelo

The marble not yet carved can hold the form of every thought the greatest artist has.

— Michelangelo

An artist does his most difficult work when he steps back from the blank canvas and thinks about what he is going…

— Michelangelo

Poets and painters have the power to dare, I mean to dare to do whatever they may approve of...

— Michelangelo

Let whoever may have attained to so much as to have the power of drawing know that he holds a great treasure.

— Michelangelo

Art is the gift of God, and must be used unto His glory. That in art is highest which aims at this.

— Michelangelo

Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it.

— Michelangelo

The best of artists has no conception that the marble alone does not contain within itself.

— Michelangelo

A good artist ought never to allow impatience to overcome his sense of the main end of art - perfection

— Michelangelo

It is better decoration when, in painting, some monstrosity is introduced for variety and a relaxation of the senses and to attract…

— Michelangelo

The sculpture is already complete within the marble block, before I start my work. It is already there, I just have to…

— Michelangelo

Your gifts lie in the place where your values, passions and strengths meet. Discovering that place is the first step toward sculpting…

— Michelangelo

I sometimes set myself thinking and imagining that I find amongst men but one single art or science, and that is drawing…

— Michelangelo

When they asked Michelangelo how he made his statue of David he is reported to have said, "It is easy. You just…

— Michelangelo

What one has most to work and struggle for in painting is to do the work with a great amount of labour…

— Michelangelo

I dare affirm that any artist... who has nothing singular, eccentric, or at least reputed to be so, in his person, will…

— Michelangelo

It is not sufficient merely to be a great master in painting and very wise, but I think that it is necessary…

— Michelangelo

For those who feel it, nothing makes the soul so religious and pure as the endeavor to create something perfect; for God…

— Michelangelo

I am no artist - please come and help me.

— Michelangelo

I was never the kind of painter or sculptor who kept a shop.

— Michelangelo

The more the marbles wastes, the more the statue grows.

— Michelangelo

An artist must have his measuring tools not in the hand, but in the eye.

— Michelangelo

One paints with one's head, not one's hand.

— Michelangelo

A good sculpture can be rolled downhill without breaking.

— Michelangelo

No one has mastery, Before he is at the end, Of his art and his life.

— Michelangelo

Art is a shadow of Divine perfection.

— Michelangelo

No great work of art is ever finished.

— Michelangelo

Art lives on constraint and dies of freedom.

— Michelangelo

The true work of art is but a shadow of the divine perfection.

— Michelangelo

I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.

— Michelangelo

Whenever a great painter... does a work which appears to be false and lying, that falsity is very true.

— Michelangelo

The greatest artist has no conception which a single block of white marble does not potentially contain within its mass, but only…

— Michelangelo

Painters are not in any way unsociable through pride, but either because they find few pursuits equal to painting, or in order…

— Michelangelo