Irving Stone Quotes

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.

I'm inspired by nature. Other artist's work is important for developing my perception.

I am following Nature without being able to grasp her, I perhaps owe having become a painter to flowers.

Nothing makes me so happy as to observe nature and to paint what I see.

Art is embedded in nature and they who can extract it, have it.

I have disciplined myself when I'm working. When I discovered art, I realized that one could keep that search going within creation. But I also realize that in order to create the art, you have to stay, you can't go too far.

The observation of nature is part of an artist's life.

One cannot fix one's eyes on the commonest natural production without finding food for a rambling fancy.

That's what's great about the arts. Everything inspires you, and you get a chance to grow from watching other people and how they do their work.

The big artist keeps an eye on nature and steals her tools.

You can't do sketches enough. Sketch everything and keep your curiosity fresh.

The challenges I face in the studio pale in comparison to when I'm out in nature.

Art is the child of Nature; yes, her darling child, in whom we trace the features of the mother's face, her aspect and her attitude.

Nature is a dictionary; one draws words from it.

Art owes its origin to Nature herself... this beautiful creation, the world, supplied the first model, while the original teacher was that divine intelligence which has not only made us superior to the other animals, but like God Himself, if I may venture to say it.

The humblest painter is a true scholar; and the best of scholars the scholar of nature.

I don't write about nature, but I'm definitely very inspired by it.

There has never been a painting that was more beautiful than nature. The model does not unfold herself to you, you must rise to her. She should be the inspiration for your painting. No man has ever over-appreciated a human being.

The richness I achieve comes from nature, the source of my inspiration.

Those who are inspired by a model other than Nature, labor in vain.

The great composer does not set to work because he is inspired, but becomes inspired because he is working. Beethoven, Wagner, Bach and Mozart settled down day after day to the job in hand with as much regularity as an accountant settles down each day to his figures. They didn't waste time waiting for inspiration.

Seek art and abstraction in nature by dreaming in the presence of it.

I believe it is no wrong Observation, that Persons of Genius, and those who are most capable of Art, are always fond of Nature, as such are chiefly sensible, that all Art consists in the Imitation and Study of Nature. On the contrary, People of the common Level of Understanding are principally delighted with the Little Niceties and Fantastical Operations of Art, and constantly think that finest which is least Natural.

Inventive man has invented nothing -- nothing from scratch. If he has produced a machine that in motion overcomes the law of gravity, he learned the essentials from the observation of birds.

With the artists, I don't teach, I coach. I can't tell them how to make art. I tell them to make more art. I tell them to get up early and stay up late. I tell them not to quit. I tell them if somebody else is already making their work. My job is to be current with the discourse and not be an asshole. That's all I wanted in a professor.