110+ Henri Matisse Quotes On Art, Color And His Art

Henri Matisse was a French artist known for his use of vibrant colors and bold shapes in his artwork. He was a leader of the Fauvism movement and is considered one of the most important figures in modern art. He is best known for his paintings, sculptures, and prints, but was also a prolific draughtsman and art theorist. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Henri Matisse on art, color, his art.

Top 10 Henri Matisse Quotes

1. There are always flowers for those who want to see them.
2. Creative people are curious, flexible, and independent with a tremendous spirit and a love of play.
3. Derive happiness in oneself from a good day's work, from illuminating the fog that surrounds us.
4. Ever since there have been men, man has given himself over to too little joy. That alone, my brothers, is our original sin. I should believe only in a God who understood how to dance.
5. I wouldn't mind turning into a vermilion goldfish.
6. Don't try to be original. Be simple. Be good technically, and if there is something in you, it will come out.
7. Nothing can be accomplished without love.
8. Impressionism is the newspaper of the soul.
9. When I paint green, it doesn't mean grass; when I paint blue, it doesn't mean sky.
10. A certain blue enters your soul. A certain red has an effect on your blood-pressure.

Henri Matisse Image Quotes

I wouldn't mind turning into a vermilion goldfish. — Henri Matisse

Nothing can be accomplished without love. — Henri Matisse

Impressionism is the newspaper of the soul. — Henri Matisse

Drawing is like making an expressive gesture with the advantage of permanence. — Henri Matisse

Henri Matisse Short Quotes

• A certain blue enters your soul
• Another word for creativity is courage.
• When you're out of will power you call on stubbornness, that's the trick.
• The energy within you is stronger than ever for being held back, compressed, and said No to.
• With greater completeness and abstraction, I have attained a form filtered to its essentials.
• Precision is not reality
• To draw is to make an idea precise. Drawing is the precision of thought.
• The wall around the window does not create two worlds.
• A colourist makes his presence known even in a simple charcoal drawing.
• Never ruin a good painting with the truth.

Henri Matisse Quotes About Art

Hatred, rancor, and the spirit of vengeance are useless baggage to the artist. His road is difficult enough for him to cleanse his soul of everything which could make it more so. — Henri Matisse

Art should be something like a good armchair in which to rest from physical fatigue. — Henri Matisse

What I dream of is an art of balance, of purity and serenity devoid of troubling or depressing subject matter - a soothing, calming influence on the mind, rather like a good armchair which provides relaxation from physical fatigue. — Henri Matisse

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. — Henri Matisse

Composition is the art of arranging in a decorative manner the various elements which the painter uses to express his sentiments. In a picture every separate part will be visible and... everything which has no utility in the picture is for that reason harmful. — Henri Matisse

What I dream of is an art of balance. — Henri Matisse

Truth and reality in art do not arise until you no longer understand what you are doing and are capable of but nevertheless sense a power that grows in proportion to your resistance. — Henri Matisse

Seek the strongest color effect possible... the content is of no importance. — Henri Matisse

What interests me most is neither still life nor landscape, but the human figure. — Henri Matisse

Truth and reality in art begin at the point where the artist ceases to understand what he is doing and capable of doing - yet feels in himself a force that becomes steadily stronger... and more concentrated. — Henri Matisse

Henri Matisse Quotes About Color

I've been forty years discovering that the queen of all colors is black. — Henri Matisse

Purer colors... have in themselves, independently of the objects they serve to express, a significant action on the feelings of those who look at them. — Henri Matisse

A thimbleful of red is redder than a bucketful. — Henri Matisse

It is only after years of preparation that the young artist should touch color - not color used descriptively, that is, but as a means of personal expression. — Henri Matisse

I cannot copy nature in a servile way; I am forced to interpret nature and submit it to the spirit of the picture. From the relationship I have found in all the tones there must result a living harmony of colors, a harmony analogous to that of a musical composition. — Henri Matisse

Color helps to express light, not the physical phenomenon, but the only light that really exists, that in the artist's brain. — Henri Matisse

With color one obtains an energy that seems to stem from witchcraft. — Henri Matisse

My choice of colors does not rest on any scientific theory, it is based on observation, on feeling, on the experience of my sensibility. — Henri Matisse

The chief function of color should be to serve expression as well as possible. — Henri Matisse

I simply try to put down colors which render my sensation — Henri Matisse

Henri Matisse Quotes About His Art

Time extracts various values from a painter's work. When these values are exhausted the pictures are forgotten, and the more a picture has to give, the greater it is. — Henri Matisse

In art, truth and reality begin when one no longer understands what one is doing or what one knows, and when there remains an energy that is all the stronger for being constrained, controlled and compressed. — Henri Matisse

Did not the artists of the great age of Japanese art change names many times during their careers? I like that; they wanted to safeguard their freedom. — Henri Matisse

What's so astonishing about not understanding? There are so many things in art, beginning with art itself, that one doesn't understand. A painter doesn't see everything that he has put in his painting. — Henri Matisse

Each work of art is a collection of signs invented during the picture's execution to suit the needs of their position. Taken out of the composition for which they were created, these signs have no further use. — Henri Matisse

I counted solely on the clarity of expression of my work to gain my ends. — Henri Matisse

I want to reach that condensation of sensations that constitutes a picture. — Henri Matisse

All that is not useful in a picture is detrimental. A work of art must be harmonious in its entirety; for superfluous details would, in the mind of the beholder, encroach upon the essential elements. — Henri Matisse

Arrival = Prison, and the artist must never be a prisoner. — Henri Matisse

I dream of an art of balance, of quietness, something analogous to a good armchair. — Henri Matisse

Henri Matisse Quotes About Colorful

The use of expressive colors is felt to be one of the basic elements of the modern mentality, an historical necessity, beyond choice. — Henri Matisse

The splitting up of color [as Impressionists did] brought the splitting up of form and contour . . . Everything is reduced to a mere sensation of the retina, but one which destroys all tranquility of surface and contour. Objects are differentiated only by the luminosity that is given them. — Henri Matisse

A certain color tones you up. It's the concentration of timbres. — Henri Matisse

Drawing is of the Spirit and color of the Senses. — Henri Matisse

Color was not given to us in order that we should imitate Nature. It was given to us so that we can express our emotions. — Henri Matisse

I am curious about color as one would be visiting a new country, because I have never concentrated so closely on color expression. Up to now I have waited at the gates of the temple. — Henri Matisse

Simple colours can affect the intimate feelings with all the more force because they are simple. — Henri Matisse

Color exists in itself, possessing its own beauty. — Henri Matisse

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. — Henri Matisse

It is with color that you render light, though you must also feel this light, have it within yourself. — Henri Matisse

Henri Matisse Quotes About Expressive

Drawing is like making an expressive gesture with the advantage of permanence. — Henri Matisse

The artist has to look at life as he did when he was a child. If he loses that faculty, he cannot express himself in an original, that is, a personal way. — Henri Matisse

An artist must possess Nature. He must identify himself with her rhythm, by efforts that will prepare the mastery which will later enable him to express himself in his own language. — Henri Matisse

Composition, the aim of which is expression, alters itself according to the surface to be covered. If I take a sheet of paper of given dimensions, I will jot down a drawing which will have a necessary relation to its format. — Henri Matisse

The whole arrangement of my picture is expressive. The place occupied by the figures or objects, the empty spaces around them, the proportions, everything plays a part. — Henri Matisse

A picture must possess a real power to generate light and for a long time now I've been conscious of expressing myself through light or rather in light. — Henri Matisse

You want to paint? First of all you must cut off your tongue because your decision takes away from you the right to express yourself with anything but your brush. — Henri Matisse

The things that are acquired consciously permit us to express ourselves unconsciously with a certain richness. — Henri Matisse

Drawing is . . . not an exercise of particular dexterity, but above all a means of expressing intimate feelings and moods. — Henri Matisse

The residuum of another's expression can never be related to one's own feeling. — Henri Matisse

Henri Matisse Quotes About Nature

A distinction is made between artists who work directly from nature and those who work purely from imagination. Neither if these methods should be preferred to the exclusion of the other. Often both are used in turn by the same man. — Henri Matisse

In the beginning you must subject yourself to the influence of nature. You must be able to walk firmly on the ground before you start walking of a tightrope. — Henri Matisse

The essential thing is to spring forth, to express the bolt of lightning one senses upon contact with a thing. The function of the artist is not to translate an observation but to express the shock of the object on his nature; the shock, with the original reaction. — Henri Matisse

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 possible, so as not to lose the objective charm which it naturally possesses. — Henri Matisse

Henri Matisse Quotes About Artist

An artist is an explorer. He has to begin by self-discovery and by observation of his own procedure. After that he must not feel under any constraint. — Henri Matisse

Above all, an artist must never be too easily satisfied with what he has done. — Henri Matisse

An artist must never be a prisoner. Prisoner? An artist should never be a prisoner of himself, prisoner of style, prisoner of reputation, prisoner of success, etc. — Henri Matisse

The role of the artist, like that of the scholar, consists of seizing current truths often repeated to him, but which will take on new meaning for him and which he will make his own when he has grasped their deepest significance. — Henri Matisse

An artist must not feel under any constraint. — Henri Matisse

I have to create an object which resembles the tree. The sign for a tree, and not the sign that other artists may have found for the tree. — Henri Matisse

When a painting is finished, it's like a new born child, and the artist himself must have time for understanding. How then do you expect an amateur to understand that which the artist dos not yet comprehend. — Henri Matisse

The artist begins with a vision - a creative operation requiring an effort. — Henri Matisse

The effort to see things without distortion takes something like courage and this courage is essential to the artist, who has to look at everything as though he saw it for the first time. — Henri Matisse

Creation is the artist's true function; where there is no creation there is no art. — Henri Matisse

Henri Matisse Quotes About Mind

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

Perhaps I might be satisfied, momentarily, with a work finished at one sitting, but I would soon get bored looking at it; therefore, I prefer to continue working on it so that later I may recognize it as a work of my mind. — Henri Matisse

The essential thing is to work in a state of mind that approaches prayer. — Henri Matisse

A new painting is a unique event, a birth, which enriches the universe as it is grasped by the human mind, by bringing a new form into it. — Henri Matisse

Henri Matisse Quotes About Paint

I don't paint things. I only paint the difference between things. — Henri Matisse

There is no interruption between my older paintings and my cutouts. Just that with an increasing sense of the absolute, and more abstraction, I have achieved a form that is simplified to its essence. — Henri Matisse

When I eat a tomato I look at it the way anyone else would. But when I paint a tomato, then I see it differently. — Henri Matisse

Expression is not a matter of passion mirrored on the human face or revealed by a violent gesture. When I paint a picture, its every detail is expressive. — Henri Matisse

Expression for me does not reside in passions glowing in a human face or manifested by violent movement. The entire arrangement of my picture is expressive; the place occupied by my figures, the empty space around them, the proportions, everything has its share. — Henri Matisse

It has always bothered me that I don't paint like everyone else — Henri Matisse

I am unable to make any distinction between the feeling I get from life and the way I translate that feeling into painting. — Henri Matisse

I do not repudiate any of my paintings but there isn't one of them that I would not redo differently, if I had it to redo. My destination is always the same but I work out a different route to get there. — Henri Matisse

Whoever wishes to devote himself to painting should begin by cutting out his own tongue — Henri Matisse

A painting in an interior spreads joy around it by the colors, which calm us. — Henri Matisse

Henri Matisse Famous Quotes And Sayings

I wouldn't mind turning into a vermilion goldfish. — Henri Matisse

Nothing can be accomplished without love. — Henri Matisse

Impressionism is the newspaper of the soul. — Henri Matisse

I never retouch a sketch: I take a canvas the same size, as I may change the composition somewhat. But I always strive to give the same feeling, while carrying it on further. — Henri Matisse

Drawing is like making an expressive gesture with the advantage of permanence. — Henri Matisse

Beauty comes from the balance between two and three dimensions, between abstraction and representation - I seek the equilibrium behind changing appearances. — Henri Matisse

You study, you learn, but you guard the original naivete. It has to be within you, as desire for drink is within the drunkard or love is within the lover. — Henri Matisse

From the first shock of the contemplation of a face depends the principal sensation which guides me throughout the entire execution of a portrait. — Henri Matisse

A young painter who cannot liberate himself from the influence of past generations is digging his own grave. — Henri Matisse

One must, of course, have one's entire experience behind one and not have lost the freshness of instinct. — Henri Matisse

There's nothing clinically wrong with me, only an emotional imbalance - I pass too quickly from the wildest enthusiasm to the blackest despair. — Henri Matisse

There are wonderful things in Jazz, the improvisation, the liveliness, the being at one with the audience. — Henri Matisse

I shan't get free of my emotion by copying the tree faithfully, or by drawing its leaves one by one in the common language, but only after identifying myself with it. — Henri Matisse

The sign is determined at the moment I use it and for the object of which it must form a part. For this reason I cannot determine in advance signs which never change, and which would be like writing: that would paralyze the freedom of my invention. — Henri Matisse

The model for me is a touchstone, it is a door which I must break open in order to reach the garden in which I am alone and feel good, even the model exists only for what use I can make of it. — Henri Matisse

I was very embarrassed when my canvases began to fetch high prices. I saw myself condemned to a future of nothing but Masterpieces. — Henri Matisse

Fit the parts together, one into the other, and build your figure like a carpenter builds a house. Everything must be constructed, composed of parts that make a whole. — Henri Matisse

What matters most to me? To work with my model until I have it enough in me to be able to improvise, to let my hand run free. — Henri Matisse

From Bonheur de Vivre - I was thirty-five then - to this cut-out - I am eighty-two - I have not changed; not in the way my friends mean who want to compliment me, no matter what, on my good health, but because all this time I have looked for the same things, which I have perhaps realized by different means. — Henri Matisse

Put a colour upon a canvas - it not only colours with that colour the part of the canvas to which the colour has been applied, but it also colours the surrounding space with the complementary. — Henri Matisse

My models, my human figures, are never like extras in an interior. They are the main theme of my work. I depend absolutely on my model. — Henri Matisse

All my efforts go into creating an art that can be understood by everyone. — Henri Matisse

...The more a picture has to give, the greater it is. — Henri Matisse

...I am driven on by an idea that I really only grasp as it grows with the picture. — Henri Matisse

Starting to paint, I felt gloriously free, quiet, and alone. — Henri Matisse

It is through the human figure that I best succeed in expressing the nearly religious feeling that I have towards life. — Henri Matisse

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

Photographs will always be impressive because they show us nature, and all artists will find in them a world of sensations. The photographer must therefore intervene as little as possible, so as not to cause photography to lose the objective charm which it naturally possesses, notwithstanding its defects. — Henri Matisse

All art worthy of the name is religious. — Henri Matisse

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

Exactitude is not truth. [Fr., L'exactitude n'est pas la verite.] — Henri Matisse

It is my dream to create an art which is filled with balance, purity and calmness, freed from a subject matter that is disconcerting or too attention-seeking. In my paintings, I wish to create a spiritual remedy, similar to a comfortable armchair which provides rest from physical expectation for the spiritually working, the businessman as well as the artist. — Henri Matisse

A work of art must carry in itself its complete significance and impose it upon the beholder even before he can identify the subject-matter. — Henri Matisse

We ought to view ourselves with the same curiosity and openness with which we study a tree, the sky or a thought, because we too are linked to the entire universe. — Henri Matisse

I have been no more than a medium, as it were. — Henri Matisse

The sign for which I forge an image has no value if it doesn't harmonize with other signs, which I must determine in the course of my invention and which are completely peculiar to it. — Henri Matisse

Life Lessons by Henri Matisse

1. Henri Matisse taught us to appreciate the beauty in everyday life and to find joy in the simple things. He encouraged us to be creative and to explore our own unique artistic style.
2. He also showed us the importance of learning from our mistakes and to never give up, even when faced with difficult challenges.
3. Finally, he showed us that it is possible to create something beautiful and meaningful out of the most mundane materials.