E Degas Quotes & Sayings

I really became convinced I wanted to tell the story of the real-life model for the Degas sculpture 'Little Dancer Aged 14,' which was unveiled in 1881, the Belle Epoque. — Cathy Marie Buchanan

There is a kind of success that is indistinguishable from panic. — Edgar Degas

The frame is the reward of the artist. — Edgar Degas

(All those paintings of women, in art galleries, surprised at private moments. Nymph Sleeping. Susanna and the Elders. Woman bathing, one foot in a tin tub - Renoir, or was it Degas? both, both women plump. Diana and her maidens, a moment before they catch the hunter's prying eyes. Never any paintings called Man Washing Socks in Sink.) — Margaret Atwood

I have seen some very beautiful things through my anger, and what consoles me a little, is that through my anger I do not stop looking... — Edgar Degas

If painting weren't so difficult, it wouldn't be fun. — Edgar Degas

The moods of sadness that come over anyone who takes up art ... these dismal moods have very little compensation. — Edgar Degas

Work a great deal at evening effects, lamplight, candlelight, etc. The intriguing thing is not to show the source of the light but the effect of the lighting. — Edgar Degas

One has to commit a painting,' said Degas,
'the way one commits a crime. — Elizabeth Bishop

Once they witnessed one of his painting sold at auction for $100,000. And asked how you do it, he said, 'I feel as a horse must feel when the beautiful cup is given to the jockey.' — Edgar Degas

Drawing is your understanding of form. — Edgar Degas

I would have been in mortal misery all my life for fear my wife might say, 'That's a pretty little thing,' after I had finished a picture. — Edgar Degas

Painting is easy when you don't know how, but very difficult when you do. — Edgar Degas

I have hundreds of art books and the biographies of artists I love, such as Thomas Eakins and Edgar Degas. — Jamie Wyeth

It is all very well to copy what one sees, but it is far better to draw what one now only sees in one's memory. That is a transformation in which imagination collaborates with memory. — Edgar Degas

A painting requires a little mystery, some vagueness, and some fantasy. When you always make your meaning perfectly plain you end up boring people — Edgar Degas

Instantaneity is photography. — Edgar Degas

It requires courage to make a frontal attack on nature through the broad planes and the large lines and it is cowardly to do it by the facets and details. It is a battle. — Edgar Degas

I should like to be famous and unknown. — Edgar Degas

For those who don't know what they are doing, painting is easy.
For those who do know what they are doing, painting is difficult. — Edgar Degas

Art is vice. You don't wed it, you rape it. — Edgar Degas

In painting you must give the idea of the true by means of the false. — Edgar Degas

Art is vice. One does not wed it, one rapes it. — Edgar Degas

I felt so insufficiently equipped, so unprepared, so weak, and at the same time it seemed to me that my reflections on art were correct. I quarreled with all the world and with myself. — Edgar Degas

The fascinating thing, is not to show the source of light, but the effect of light. — Edgar Degas

I really have a lot of stuff in my head; if only there were insurance companies for that as there are for so many things. — Edgar Degas

Women can never forgive me; they hate me, they feel that I am disarming them. I show them without their coquetry. — Edgar Degas

One must have a high opinion of a work of art - not the work one is creating at the moment, but of that which one desires to achieve one day. Without this it is not worthwhile working. — Edgar Degas

Everybody has talent at
twenty-five. The difficult thing is to have it at fifty. — Edgar Degas

I would like to be famous but unknown. — Edgar Degas