Work alone will efface the footsteps of work.

As light fades and the shadows deepen, all petty and exacting details vanish, everything trivial disappears, and I see things as they are in great strong masses: the buttons are lost, but the sitter remains; the sitter is lost, but the shadow remains; the shadow is lost, but the picture remains. And that, night cannot efface from the painter's imagination.

You shouldn't say it is not good. You should say, you do not like it; and then, you know, you're perfectly safe.

To say to the painter that Nature is to be taken as she is, is to say to the player that he may sit on the piano.

Nature contains the elements, in colour and form, of all pictures, as the keyboard contains the notes of all music. But the artists is born to pick, and choose, and group with science, these elements, that the result may be beautiful - as the musician gathers his notes, and forms his chords, until he brings forth from chaos glorious harmony

The work of a master reeks not of the sweat of the brow - suggests no effort - and is finished from its beginning.

I remember that at one time I always made a drawing before going to bed!! - Of myself I mean - though I finally destroyed most of them.