Gustave Courbet Quotes

Fine art is knowledge made visible.

Beauty, like truth, is relative to the time when one lives and to the individual who can grasp it.

The expression of beauty is in direct ratio to the power of conception the artist has acquired.

I am fifty years old and I have always lived in freedom; let me end my life free; when I am dead let this be said of me: 'He belonged to no school, to no church, to no institution, to no academy, least of all to any regime except the regime of liberty.'

France is the only nation in which astoundingly small numbers of civilized patrons reside.

I have never seen an angel. Show me an angel, and I'll paint one.

I have never seen either angels or goddesses, so I am not interested in painting them.

Beauty lies in nature and reveals, once the artist has perceived it, its own expressive power.

When I am no longer controversial, I will no longer be important

I am not one who was born in the custody of wisdom; I am one who is fond of olden times and intense in quest of the sacred knowing of the ancients.

I hope to live all my life for my art, without abandoning my principles one iota.

The beautiful is in nature, and it is encountered under the most diverse forms of reality. Once it is found it belongs to art, or rather to the artist who discovers it.

Painting is the representation of visible forms. The essence of realism is its negation of the ideal.

The principle of realism means denial of the ideal.

I hope to live all my life for my art, without abandoning my principles one iota, without . . . having painted as much as you can cover with your hand, to please somebody or in order to sell the picture more easily.