Henri Matisse Quotes

To look at something as though we had never seen it before requires great courage.

I didn't expect to recover from my second operation but since I did, I consider that I'm living on borrowed time. Every day that dawns is a gift to me and I take it in that way. I accept it gratefully without looking beyond it. I completely forget my physical suffering and all the unpleasantness of my present condition and I think only of the joy of seeing the sun rise once more and of being able to work a little bit, even under difficult conditions.

There is nothing more difficult for a truly creative painter than to paint a rose because before he can do so he has first to forget all the roses that were ever painted.

Don't wait for inspiration. It comes while working.

Exactitude is not truth.

You must forget all your theories, all your ideas before the subject. What part of these is really your own will be expressed in your expression of the emotion awakened in you by the subject.

The importance of an artist is to be measured by the quantity of new signs which he has introduced to the language of art.

I don't know whether I believe in God or not. I think, really, I'm some kind of a Buddhist. But the essential thing is to put oneself in a frame of mind which is close to that of prayer.

A work should contain its total meaning within itself and should impress it on the spectator before he even knows the subject.

Creativity takes courage.

From the moment I held the box of colors in my hands, I knew this was my life. I threw myself into it like a beast that plunges towards the thing it loves.

I do not distinguish between the construction of a book and that of a painting and I always proceed from the simple to the complex." - 1946