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Here are my top 12 Claude Monet quotes.
Claude Monet (1840 – 1926) was a founder of French impressionist painting. The term Impressionism is derived from the title of his painting Impression, Sunrise.
In later years he experimented with optical color mixing techniques, in his series paintings. The most famous of these series paintings are the Rouen cathedral series of paintings which capture the façade of the cathedral at different times of the day and year, and reflect changes in its appearance under different lighting conditions.
Another series of paintings was the haystack series which similarly captures light effects at different times of the day. He also painted a series of paintings of the Houses of Parliament on the Thames River in London.
I have spent a lot of time studying all of these paintings and his techniques. He often used a scumbling technique in which he built the paint up in layers.
It is also said that the French Impressionists also thought about space division more as a result of having studied Japanese wood block prints in which the spaces were carefully thought out.
Monet was important because in addition to his optical color mixing research, he also started to investigate hue changes on a form. This was new to painting and took color to a more sophisicated level than the classical realist type of paintings. In general Monet noticed the hue changes, but did not fully master the saturation changes which later painters, such as Bongart and Hensche, studied and further developed in the 20th century.
My Top 12 Monet Quotes
Now I really feel the landscape. I can be bold and include every tone of pink and blue: it’s enchanting, it’s delicious.
— Claude Monet
I can understand this feeling. You have to live in the landscape till it becomes a part of you. Only then will you have the confidence and knowledge of its forms and color to be bold in your brushwork.
I would like to paint the way a bird sings
— Claude Monet
This is the freedom we all seek. But it takes years of practice to be sufficiently skilled in the fundamentals that you can then forget about them and be free in your work.
The richness I achieve comes from nature, the source of my inspiration.
— Claude Monet
Around 1843, the art critic John Ruskin said an artist should observe nature closely and stay true to it (“truth to nature”) and not be invented, or follow strict rules of composition. He believed that all great art should communicate an understanding and appreciation of nature.
Truth in art is as important as truth in life.
No one is an artist unless he carries his picture in his head before painting it, and is sure of his method and composition.
— Claude Monet
I agree and disagree. You do need a clear idea of your main design idea before you start painting. But you must let the painting decide where it is going and you cannot always predict that in advance.
I have never had a studio, and I do not understand shutting oneself up in a room. To draw, yes; to paint, no.
— Claude Monet
The beautiful colors are in nature.
The more I live, the more I regret how little I know.
— Claude Monet
I wish I had started painting before I was born.
Etretat is becoming more and more amazing. Now is the real moment: the beach with all its fine boats; it is superb, and I am enraged not to be more skillful in rendering all this. I would need two hands and hundreds of canvases.
— Claude Monet
You don’t need to render it all. Capture its essence. That’s enough.
Every day I discover even more beautiful things. It is intoxicating me, and I want to paint it all – my head is bursting.
— Claude Monet
We are so lucky to be painters. We see so much beauty.
People discuss my art and pretend to understand as if it were necessary to understand, when it’s simply necessary to love.
— Claude Monet
You don’t need to know anything about art to know when it’s good. Art is inmate in all of us.
I’m not performing miracles, I’m using up and wasting a lot of paint.
— Claude Monet
If you want to explore color harmony you need paint. Lots of it. If you don’t have a big blob of it on your palette, you can’t clearly see what color it is.
Thank You
Thank you for taking the time to read this article. I hope you find it useful. If you would like to get free painting tips by email, please sign up for my free tips newsletter.
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Happy painting!
Barry John Raybould
Virtual Art Academy
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Pin These Claude Monet Quotes
For More Information on Claude Monet
See Wikipedia: Claude Monet
Hello, I am seeking the origins of a famous quote which Cezanne apparently made to a critic about the theme of sunsets. The critic studied a said this does not look like a sunset to which Cezanne said, ‘You don’t see sunsets the way I do’. Could you or anyone tell me if this is a false quote, or true?
I picked up on your reference to Ruskin and of course, Monet also worked in London, and the famous sunset painting, it could be Monet who said this? Thank you very much. Lindsey
I don’t have any source that supports Monet making this quote. However there is a source for Cezanne having said it. See Bolman & Deal (2013). Bolman, L. G., & Deal, T. E. (2011). Leading with soul: An uncommon journey of spirit (3rd ed.).
San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.