170 Graphic Artist Quotes

Following is our list of graphic artist quotations and slogans full of insightful wisdom and perspective about graphic design.

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Famous Graphic Artist Quotes

Commercial Art tries to make you buy things. Graphic Design gives you ideas. — Chip Kidd

Graphic design is the fiction that anticipates the fact. — Michael Bierut

Graphic Design is the communication of information in an appropriate visual manner. — Massimo Vignelli

The challenge is for the graphic designer to turn data into information and information into messages of meaning. — Katherine McCoy

A designer is a planner with an aesthetic sense. — Bruno Munari

A designer is an emerging synthesis of artist, inventor, mechanic, objective economist and evolutionary strategist. — Richard Buckminster Fuller

I'm an artist who works with pictures and words. Sometimes that stuff ends up in different kinds of sites and contexts which determine what it means and looks like. — Barbara Kruger

Graphic design will save the world right after rock and roll does. - David Carson

Graphic design will save the world right after rock and roll does. — David Carson

I see graphic design as the organization of information that is semantically correct, syntactically consistent and pragmatically understandable. — Massimo Vignelli

No one loves authenticity like a graphic designer. And no one is quite as good at simulating it. — Michael Bierut

Designers are closer to artists than to engineers. — Bernard Arnault

Design is, literally, purposeful planning. Graphic Design, then, is the form those plans will take. — Chip Kidd

Designers can create normalcy out of chaos; they can clearly communicate ideas through the organising and manipulating of words and pictures. — Jeffrey Veen

I'm an artist, a designer, a craftsman, interior designer, half-architect. There's no one name that fits me very well. — Dale Chihuly

We designers, we don't work in a vacuum. We need business people. We are not the fine artists we are often confused with. — Dieter Rams

Short Graphic Artist Quotes

  • An artist is somebody who produces things that people don't need to have. — Andy Warhol
  • Design is thinking made visual. — Saul Bass
  • Good art inspires; Good design motivates. — Otl Aicher
  • You can have an art experience in front of a Rembrandt... or in front of a piece of graphic design. — Stefan Sagmeister
  • An artist is a man who says a difficult thing in a simple way — Sayings
  • I am an artist at living - my work of art is my life. — D.T. Suzuki
  • He who pretends to be either painter or engraver without being a master of drawing is an imposter. — William Blake
  • Design is not art. Design is utilitarian, art is not. — Massimo Vignelli
  • Design is a solution to a problem. Art is a question to a problem. — John Maeda
  • A painter is a choreographer of space. — Barnett Newman

Graphic Artist Image Quotes

Graphic artist quote No artist tolerates reality.
No artist tolerates reality.

Graphic Art Quotes

He who works with his hands and his head and his heart is an artist - Francis of Assisi

He who works with his hands and his head and his heart is an artist — Francis of Assisi

The life of a designer is a life of fight. Fight against the ugliness. Just like a doctor fights against disease. For us, the visual disease is what we have around, and what we try to do is cure it somehow with design. — Massimo Vignelli

Perfect typography is certainly the most elusive of all arts. Sculpture in stone alone comes near it in obstinacy. — Jan Tschichold

Graphic artist quote There is nothing more truly artistic than to love people.
There is nothing more truly artistic than to love people.

Creating is about sharing ideas, sharing aesthetics, sharing what you believe in with other people. — Shepard Fairey

The art of any propagandist and agitator consists in his ability to find the best means of influencing any given audience, by presenting a definite truth, in such a way as to make it most convincing, most easy to digest, most graphic, and most strongly impressive. — Vladimir Lenin

The artist constructs a new symbol with his brush. This symbol is not a recognizable form of anything which is already finished, already made, already existing in the world - it is a symbol of a new world, which is being built upon and which exists by way of people. — El Lissitzky

Graphic artist quote A true artist is not one who is inspired, but one who ispires others.
A true artist is not one who is inspired, but one who ispires others.

The observer must learn to look at the picture as a graphic representation of a mood and not as a representation of objects. — Wassily Kandinsky

Design can be art. Design can be aesthetics. Design is so simple, that's why it is so complicated. — Paul Rand

The wonders of the Grand Canyon cannot be adequately represented in symbols of speech, nor by speech itself. The resources of the graphic art are taxed beyond their powers in attempting to portray its features. Language and illustration combined must fail. — John Wesley Powell

The life of a designer is a life of fight: fight against the ugliness. — Massimo Vignelli

Graphic Design Quotes

It's through mistakes that you actually can grow. You have to get bad in order to get good. — Paula Scher

There is no design without discipline. There is no discipline without intelligence. — Massimo Vignelli

Helvetica is the jeans, and Univers the dinner jacket. Helvetica is here to stay. — Adrian Frutiger

Graphic artist quote Every artist was first an amateur.
Every artist was first an amateur.

Digital design is like painting, except the paint never dries. — Neville Brody

An electrician isn't an opinion former, but a graphic designer is. My argument is that all graphic designers hold high levels of responsibility in society. We take invisible ideas and make them tangible. That's our job. — Neville Brody

You can do a good ad without good typography, but you can't do a great ad without good typography. — Herb Lubalin

If you can design one thing, you can design everything. - Massimo Vignelli

If you can design one thing, you can design everything. — Massimo Vignelli

Asymmetry is the rhythmic expression of funtional design. In addition to being more logical, asymmetry has the advantage that its complete appearance is far more optically effective than symmetry. — Jan Tschichold

Typographical design should perform optically what the speaker creates through voice and gesture of his thoughts. — El Lissitzky

I want to make beautiful things, even if nobody cares, as opposed to ugly things. That's my intent. — Saul Bass

Visual Artist Quotes

There is no must in art because art is free. — Wassily Kandinsky

Doing graphic novels is cool! It's fun! You get to write something, and then see it visually page by page, panel by panel, working with the artist, you get to see it fleshed out. — Anthony Bourdain

Good design is a lot like clear thinking made visual. — Edward Tufte

Graphic artist quote I feel that there is nothing more truly artistic than to love people.
I feel that there is nothing more truly artistic than to love people.

I think that a visual artist's philosophy develops much more freely than a writer's or a thinker's philosophy. It is not so disciplined. The photographer works with both his eyes and his mind. — Manuel Alvarez Bravo

What to paint was a problem for the war artist... the old heroics, the death and glory stuff, were gone forever... the impressionistic technique I had developed was now ineffective, for visual impressions were not enough. — A. Y. Jackson

Mark Ryden is my favorite visual artist. — Melanie Martinez

Graphic artist quote Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist
Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist

Abstract means literally to draw from or separate. In this sense every artist is abstract for he must create his own work from his visual impressions. A realistic or non-objective approach makes no difference. The result is what counts. — Richard Diebenkorn

A lot of musicians are good cooks, and a lot of cooks are musicians, but I think that may just be a result of the creative impulse finding several means of expression. Probably an equivalent number are visual artists, woodworkers or compulsive liars. — Steve Albini

We used the camera only as a means of expression and as a visual medium that offers possibilities found in no other artistic technique, possibilities that the eye cannot catch in their totality. We tried to establish a characteristic vision of photography. — Piet Zwart

Color, like everything else concerning visual expression, usually boils down to a gift, an innate sensibility and sensitivity. Ultimately, artists develop their own palette and color sense. — Scott Kahn

Graphic Quotes

For me, typography is a triangular relationship between design idea, typographic elements, and printing technique. — Wolfgang Weingart

What's the use of being legible, when nothing inspires you to take notice of it? — Wolfgang Weingart

I like to step into areas where I am afraid. Fear is a sign that I am going in the right direction. — April Greiman

Graphic artist quote Learn the rules like a pro so you can break them like an artist.
Learn the rules like a pro so you can break them like an artist.

The most popular typefaces are the easiest to read; their popularity has made them disappear from conscious cognition. It becomes impossible to tell if they are easy to read because they are commonly used, or if they are commonly used because they are easy to read. — Zuzana Licko

We`re not here for a long time, we`re here for a good time / Reach For the Sky, 'cause tomorrow may never come. — Mike Ness

For after all, a poster does more than simply supply information on the goods it advertises; it also reveals a society’s state of mind — Armin Hofmann

Comic books and graphic novels are a great medium. It's incredibly underused. - Darren Aronofsky

Comic books and graphic novels are a great medium. It's incredibly underused. — Darren Aronofsky

You can't do better design with a computer, but you can speed up your work enormously. — Wim Crouwel

Birds in flight fascinate me. I admire eagles and falcons. I’m inspired by a feather but also its color, its graphics, its weightlessness and its engineering. It’s so elaborate. In fact I try and transpose the beauty of a bird to women. — Alexander McQueen

Logos are a graphic extension of the internal realities of a company. — Saul Bass

Graphic Novels Quotes

I like the idea of making big budget films with a heart. I like graphic novels more than comic books. — Matthew Vaughn

When I put together a graphic novel, I don't think about literary prose. I think about storytelling. — Ted Rall

If I had to rank my skills, I have a long way to go before I can write a good graphic novel. — Ted Rall

Graphic artist quote No great artist ever sees things as they really are. If he did he would cease to be an artist.
No great artist ever sees things as they really are. If he did he would cease to be an artist.

I don't think anyone has written a great graphic novel. — Ted Rall

Oh, I’m nerdy about science fiction and fantasy and graphic novels and reading, and I’m nerdy about board games. My favorite board game is a board game I’m working on right now. It’s a game of Napoleonic era naval warfare, and it’s going to be fun. — Billy Campbell

The 'Barnaby' books were always intended to be graphic novels. — Janet Evanovich

Graphic artist quote Every child is an artist. The challenge is to remain an artist after you grow up.
Every child is an artist. The challenge is to remain an artist after you grow up.

People unacquainted with graphic novels, including journalists, tend to think of Watchmen as a book by Alan Moore that happens to have some illustrations. And that does a disservice to the entire form. — Dave Gibbons

Expand the definition of 'reading' to include non-fiction, humor, graphic novels, magazines, action adventure, and, yes, even websites. It's the pleasure of reading that counts; the focus will naturally broaden. A boy won't read shark books forever. — Jon Scieszka

As you know, transforming such a big book [The Gunslinger Born] into graphic novel format is really a process of translation. — Robin Furth

People are so afraid to say the word "comic". It makes you think of a grown man with pimples, a ponytail and a big belly. Change it to "graphic novel" and that disappears. — Marjane Satrapi

Graphic Design Inspiration Quotes

Never fall in love with an idea. They're whores: if the one you're with isn't doing the job, there's always, always, always another. — Chip Kidd

If you do good work for good clients, it will lead to other good work for other good clients. If you do bad work for bad clients, it will lead to other bad work for other bad clients. — Michael Bierut

They must find it difficult ... those who have taken authority as the truth, rather than truth as the authority. — Gerald Massey

Graphic artist quote Good artists borrow, great artists steal.
Good artists borrow, great artists steal.

Good design keeps the user happy, the manufacturer in the black and the aesthete unoffended. — Raymond Loewy

Simplicity, carried to an an extreme, becomes elegance. — Jon Franklin

Design is the application of intent - the opposite of happenstance, and an antidote to accident. — Robert L. Peters

Graphic artist quote Be your own artist, and always be confident in what you're doing. If you're not going to be confiden
Be your own artist, and always be confident in what you're doing. If you're not going to be confident, you might as well not be doing it.

It's very easy to be different, but very difficult to be better. — Jonathan Ive

Don't worry about people stealing your design work. Worry about the day they stop. — Jeffrey Zeldman

Design creates culture. Culture shapes values. Values determine the future. — Robert L. Peters

If design isn't profitable, then it's art. — Henrik Fisker

Comic Art Quotes

No. Not even in the face of Armageddon. Never compromise. — Alan Moore

The method of producing comics in Japan is very hectic, but it's also rewarding because it's possible to do both the story and art all by yourself. — Akira Toriyama

The pop artists did images that anybody walking down Broadway could recognize in a split second — comics, picnic tables, men’s trousers, celebrities, shower curtains, refrigerators, Coke bottles. All the great modern things that the Abstract Expressionists tried not to notice at all. — Andy Warhol

I felt the comics grew because they became the common man's literature, the common man's art, the common man's publishing. — Jack Kirby

I think comics are faster to draw with a pen and then fill and tone by computer. But my illustrations are all done via computer. — Akira Toriyama

The method of producing comics in Japan is very hectic, but it's also rewarding because it's possible to do both the story and art all by yourself. In this way, it's possibly to bring out one's individuality. If this idea appeals to you, I call on you to try drawing your own manga. — Akira Toriyama

It's not movies and it's not "fine art." The beauty of a comic is that it's clear, direct communication. My work is getting simpler and more cartoony because I'm much more interested in communication now than in any illustrative value. — Frank Miller

Satire is moral outrage transformed into comic art. — Philip Roth

Artists are not your art monkeys. They are your collaborators. They should be given all due consideration to follow their journey. — Sayings

Comics as art. I do comics as comics, and my opportunity to tell stories. Simple. Basic. Let the characters have the excitement, not the package. That's where I come from. — Jaime Hernandez

Woman Artist Quotes

The moment a woman comes home to herself, the moment she knows that she has become a person of influence, an artist of her life, a sculptor of her universe, a person with rights and responsibilities who is respected and recognized, the resurrection of the world begins. — Joan D. Chittister

The men liked to put me down as the best woman painter. I think I'm one of the best painters. — Georgia O'Keeffe

She was a sweet girl but not really pretty, a rough sketch of a woman with a little of everything in her, one of those silhouettes which artists draw in three strokes on the tablecloth in a café after dinner, between a glass of brandy and a cigarette. Nature sometimes turns out creatures like that. — Guy de Maupassant

I believe that all women are pretty without makeup- but with the right makeup can be pretty powerful. — Bobbi Brown

I am not an angel and do not pretend to be. That is not one of my roles. But I am not the devil either. I am a woman and a serious artist, and I would like so to be judged. — Maria Callas

It was not very easy for a woman to impose herself as a modern artist in Germany… Most of our male colleagues continued for a long time to look upon us as charming and gifted amateurs, denying us implicitly any real professional status. — Hannah Hoch

I paint German artists whom I admire. I paint their pictures, their work as painters, and their portraits too. But oddly enough, each of these portraits ends up as a picture of a woman with blonde hair. I myself have never been able to work out why this happens. — Georg Baselitz

If painting is no longer needed, it seems a pity that some of us are born into the world with such a passion for line and color. — Mary Cassatt

The only thing I know is that I know nothing — Socrates

I don't paint like a woman is supposed to paint. Thank God, art doesn't bother about things like that. — Alice Neel

Visual Art Quotes

Art works because it appeals to certain faculties of the mind. Music depends on details of the auditory system, painting and sculpture on the visual system. Poetry and literature depend on language. — Steven Pinker

I mean, making art is about objectifying your experience of the world, transforming the flow of moments into something visual, or textual, or musical, whatever. Art creates a kind of commentary. — Barbara Kruger

The world of visual perspective is one of unified and homogeneous space. Such a world is alien to the resonating diversity of spoken words. So language was the last art to accept the visual logic of Gutenberg technology, and the first to rebound in the electric age. — Marshall McLuhan

Our one goal is to give the world a taste of peace, friendship and understanding. Through the visual arts, the art of celebration of life. — Steven Spielberg

In learning the art of storytelling by animation, I have discovered that language has an anatomy. — Walt Disney

I like photography because it is a reality medium, unlike drawing which is unreal. I like to mess with reality...to bend reality. Some of my works beg the question of is it real or not? — Storm Thorgerson

The style of ancient Egyptian art is transcendently clear, something 8-year-olds can recognize in an instant. Its consistency and codification is one of the most epic visual journeys in all art, one that lasts 30 dynasties spread over 3,000 years. — Jerry Saltz

Architecture is a visual art, and the buildings speak for themselves. — Julia Morgan

Don't be afraid of expressing what you really mean in your art, what you really feel. Say it visually, as strongly as you can. Push as far a reach as you can, then go all the way! — Kay WalkingStick

We never really perceive what color really is, as it physically is. This fact makes color the most relative medium in art. — Josef Albers

Graffiti Artist Quotes

People say graffiti is ugly, irresponsible and childish... but that's only if it's done properly. — Banksy

Graffiti is one of the few tools you have if you have almost nothing. And even if you don't come up with a picture to cure world poverty you can make someone smile while they're having a piss. — Banksy

Bursts of gold on lavender melting into saffron. It's the time of day when the sky looks like it has been spray-painted by a graffiti artist. — Mia Kirshner

Graffiti is one of the few tools you have if you have almost nothing. - Banksy

Graffiti is one of the few tools you have if you have almost nothing. — Banksy

Some people become cops because they want to make the world a better place. Some people become vandals because they want to make the world a better looking place. — Banksy

Writing graffiti is about the most honest way you can be an artist. It takes no money to do it, you don't need an education to understand it, and there's no admission fee. — Banksy

You're mind is working at its best when you're being paranoid. You explore every avenue and possibility of your situation at high speed with total clarity. — Banksy

A lot of mothers will do anything for their children, except let them be themselves. — Banksy

I mean, they say you die twice. One time when you stop breathing and a second time, a bit later on, when somebody says your name for the last time. — Banksy

The greatest crimes in the world are not committed by people breaking the rules but by people following the rules. It's people who follow orders that drop bombs and massacre villages. — Banksy

People Writing About Graphic Artist

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Read quotes by Bruno Munari

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More Graphic Artist Quotes

An artist is not paid for his labor but for his vision. — James Whistler

Type design moves at the pace of the most conservative reader. The good type-designer therefore realizes that, for a new font to be successful, it has to be so good that only very few recognize its novelty. — Stanley Morison

Design is the conscious effort to impose a meaningful order — Victor Papanek

A designer can mull over complicated designs for months. Then suddenly the simple, elegant, beautiful solution occurs to him. When it happens to you, it feels as if God is talking! And maybe He is. — Leo Frankowski

Design is in everything we make, but it's also between those things. It's a mix of craft, science, storytelling, propaganda, and philosophy. — Erik Adigard

Designers may be the true intellectuals of the future. — Paola Antonelli

The most innovative designers consciously reject the standard option box and cultivate an appetite for thinking wrong. — Marty Neumeier

There are now about as many different varieties of letters as there are different kinds of fools. — Eric Gill

The public is more familiar with bad design than good design. It is, in effect, conditioned to prefer bad design, because that is what it lives with. The new becomes threatening, the old reassuring. — Paul Rand

Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. — Jim Jarmusch

Select only things to steal that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your work (and theft) will be authentic. Authenticity is invaluable; originality is nonexistent — Jim Jarmusch

I wanted to show that an African-American artist could make it in this country on a national level in the graphic arts. I want to be a strong role model for my family and for other African Americans. — Jerry Pinkney

I have to perfect my beard every morning and it takes a long time. I think a lot of musicians are into graphic design and art. I decided to be a little bit of an artist on my face. — Craig David

Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. — Jim Jarmusch

Design is the fundamental soul of a human-made creation that ends up expressing itself in successive outer layers of the product or service. — Steve Jobs

I don't see myself as an artist. I work with artists and collaborate with them, but then it becomes graphic design. It's not an art. I'm a graphic designer. — Vaughan Oliver

Drawing is the cornerstone of the graphic, plastic arts. Drawing is the coordination of line, tone, and color symbols into formations that express the artist's thought. — John French Sloan

Unlike the photography and prints, I never catalogued, kept track of or exhibited the sketches. I sold some occasionally, but never saw myself as a graphic artist. They became more important to me thanks to the exhibition, however, and I realized that these drawings were quite interesting after all. — Gerhard Richter

The majority of photographers still seek artistic effects, imitating other mediums of graphic expression. The result is a hybrid product that does not succeed in giving their work the most valuable characteristic it should have, - photographic quality. — Tina Modotti

I've always considered myself a graphic artists - a draftsman - as opposed to a typist. I do still work on a drawing table. At times drawing on a computer feels like I'm drawing on an Etch-a-Sketch. — Michael Schwab

Design is as much an act of spacing as an act of marking. — Ellen Lupton

In the visual arts, for example, the semiological approach to graphics provides a rigorous analysis of the visual means used by the artist. It defines the basic properties and laws governing the arts and suggests objective criteria for art criticism. — Jacques Bertin

Design is where science and art break even. — Robin Mathews

When you hold a graphic novel in your hands, you're holding artist blood made ink. — Molly Crabapple

I am a graphic artist heart and soul, though I find the term artist rather embarrassing. — M. C. Escher

This is the launch of the Doctor Strange film interpretation, of - in my view - a classic, which has been interpreted many times by other graphic artists and this is just our graphic interpretation of The Ancient One. I would say the whole approach is about a kind of fluidity. — Tilda Swinton

The design process, at its best, integrates the aspirations of art, science, and culture. — Jeff Smith

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