Art has the power to inspire, captivate, and enrich our lives. It allows us to express ourselves, communicate our thoughts and feelings, and explore new worlds. To help ignite your students’ passion for art, we’ve compiled a list of quotes about art that will spark their creativity and encourage them to appreciate the beauty of artistic expression.
1. “Art is not what you see, but what you make others see.” – Edgar Degas
2. “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.” – Pablo Picasso
3. “Art is the lie that enables us to realize the truth.” – Pablo Picasso
4. “Creativity takes courage.” – Henri Matisse
5. “Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.” – Pablo Picasso
6. “Painting is just another way of keeping a diary.” – Pablo Picasso
7. “Art is the only way to run away without leaving home.” – Twyla Tharp
8. “Art is not a thing, it is a way.” – Elbert Hubbard
9. “Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.” – Thomas Merton
10. “The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance.” – Aristotle
11. “The true work of art is but a shadow of the divine perfection.” – Michelangelo
12. “Art is the most intense mode of individualism that the world has known.” – Oscar Wilde
13. “Life beats down and crushes the soul, and art reminds you that you have one.” – Stella Adler
14. “Every artist was first an amateur.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
15. “Art speaks where words are unable to explain.” – Unknown
16. “Art is not a handicraft, it is the transmission of feeling the artist has experienced.” – Leo Tolstoy
17. “The purpose of art is to raise people to a higher level of awareness than they would otherwise attain on their own.” – Brady Allen
18. “Art is a collaboration between God and the artist, and the less the artist does the better.” – André Gide
19. “The earth without art is just ‘eh’.” – Unknown
20. “Art is a line around your thoughts.” – Gustav Klimt
21. “Without art, the crudeness of reality would make the world unbearable.” – George Bernard Shaw
22. “To be an artist is to believe in life.” – Henry Moore
23. “Art is when you hear a knocking from your soul — and you answer.” – Terri Guillemets
24. “A picture is a poem without words.” – Horace
25. “Art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable.” – Banksy
26. “The chief enemy of creativity is good sense.” – Pablo Picasso
27. “Art is the daughter of freedom.” – Friedrich Schiller
28. “Art is the stored honey of the human soul.” – Theodore Dreiser
29. “Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures.” – Henry Ward Beecher
30. “A work of art is the unique result of a unique temperament.” – Oscar Wilde
31. “In art, the hand can never execute anything higher than the heart can imagine.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
32. “Art is the lie that tells the truth.” – Jean Cocteau
33. “I dream my painting and I paint my dream.” – Vincent van Gogh
34. “Art is not a mirror held up to reality, but a hammer with which to shape it.” – Bertolt Brecht
35. “The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without work.” – Émile Zola
36. “Art is not a thing; it is a way.” – Elbert Hubbard
37. “Art is the journey of a free soul.” – Alev Oguz
38. “If you hear a voice within you say ‘you cannot paint,’ then by all means paint and that voice will be silenced.” – Vincent van Gogh
39. “Art opens the closets, airs out the cellars and attics. It brings healing.” – Julia Cameron
40. “Art is the signature of civilizations.” – Beverly Sills
41. “Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.” – Scott Adams
42. “Art is a step from what is obvious and well-known toward what is arcane and concealed.” – Khalil Gibran
43. “An artist is not paid for his labor but for his vision.” – James Whistler
44. “In art, immorality cannot exist. Art is always sacred.” – Auguste Rodin
45. “An artist cannot fail; it is a success to be one.” – Charles Horton Cooley
46. “Great art picks up where nature ends.” – Marc Chagall
47. “Art is not the application of a canon of beauty but what the instinct and the brain can conceive beyond any canon.” – Pablo Picasso
48. “Art is the proper task of life.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
49. “An artist paints with his brains and not with his hands.” – Michelangelo
50. “The role of the artist is to ask questions, not to answer them.” – Anton Chekhov
51. “The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery.” – Francis Bacon
52. “Creativity is an act of defiance.” – Twyla Tharp
53. “Art must be an expression of love or it is nothing.” – Marc Chagall
54. “Art is the triumph over chaos.” – John Cheever
55. “Every canvas is a journey all its own.” – Helen Frankenthaler
56. “The essence of all beautiful art, all great art, is gratitude.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
57. “The highest art is always the most religious, and the greatest artist is always a devout person.” – Abraham Lincoln
58. “Art is never finished, only abandoned.” – Leonardo da Vinci
59. “The greater the artist, the greater the doubt. Perfect confidence is granted to the less talented as a consolation prize.” – Robert Hughes
60. “The artist’s world is limitless. It can be found anywhere, far from where he lives or a few feet away. It is always on his doorstep.” – Paul Strand
61. “Painting is poetry that is seen rather than felt, and poetry is painting that is felt rather than seen.” – Leonardo da Vinci
62. “The artist is a receptacle for emotions that come from all over the place: from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider’s web.” – Pablo Picasso
63. “The purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls.” – Pablo Picasso
64. “Art is a collaboration between God and the artist, and the less the artist does, the better.” – André Gide
65. “To send light into the darkness of men’s hearts – such is the duty of the artist.” – Robert Schumann
66. “The artist’s vocation is to send light into the human heart.” – George Sand
67. “The art of a people is a true mirror of their minds.” – Jawaharlal Nehru
68. “Art evokes the mystery without which the world would not exist.” – René Magritte
69. “The world of reality has its limits; the world of imagination is boundless.” – Jean-Jacques Rousseau
70. “The principles of true art is not to portray, but to evoke.” – Jerzy Kosinski
71. “Art is not a mirror to reflect reality, but a hammer with which to shape it.” – Bertolt Brecht
72. “Art is to console those who are broken by life.” – Vincent van Gogh
73. “Art is not in the eye of the beholder. It’s in the soul of the artist.” – Seth Godin
74. “Art is what happens when you dare to be who you really are.” – Paulo Coelho
75. “Art is the highest form of hope.” – Gerhard Richter
76. “Art, freedom and creativity will change society faster than politics.” – Victor Pinchuk
77. “Art is an adventure into an unknown world, which can be explored only by those willing to take risks.” – Mark Rothko
78. “Art is to look at not to criticize.” – Edgar Degas
79. “The job of art is to chase ugliness away.” – Bono
80. “In art as in love, instinct is enough.” – Anatole France
81.”Art does not reproduce what we see. It makes us see.” – Paul Klee
82. “Art is the most passionate orgy within man’s grasp.” – John Donne
83. “The world always seems brighter when you’ve just made something that wasn’t there before.” – Neil Gaiman
84. “Art is the lie that reveals truth.” – Picasso
85. “Art is the objectification of feeling.” – Herman Melville
86. “The moment you think you understand a great work of art, it’s dead for you.” – Oscar Wilde
87. “Art is not a reflection of reality, it is the reality of a reflection.” – Jean-Luc Godard
88. “Every good painter paints what he is.” – Jackson Pollock
89. “Art doesn’t have to be pretty. It has to be meaningful.” – Duane Hanson
90. “Art is a revolt against fate.” – Andre Malraux
91. “Art should disturb the comfortable, and comfort the disturbed.” – Unknown
92. “Art is much less important than life, but what a poor life without it.” – Robert Motherwell
93. “We don’t make mistakes, just happy little accidents.” – Bob Ross
94. “Art is how we decorate space; music is how we decorate time.” – Jean-Michel Basquiat
95. “Art is anything you can get away with.” – Marshall McLuhan
96. “Art is a lie that makes us realize the truth.” – Pablo Picasso
97. “Art is the only serious thing in the world. And the artist is the only person who is never serious.” – Oscar Wilde
98. “Art is not freedom from discipline, but disciplined freedom.” – John F. Kennedy
99. “Art is standing with one hand extended into the universe and one hand extended into the world, and letting ourselves be a conduit for passing energy.” – Albert Einstein
100. “Art is the elimination of the unnecessary.” – Pablo Picasso
101. “Art must destroy violence, only it can do it.” – Leo Tolstoy
102. “Art is not a mirror to hold up to society, but a hammer with which to shape it.” – Leon Trotsky
103. “Art, like morality, consists in drawing the line somewhere.” – G.K. Chesterton
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