I hope with all my heart there will be painting in heaven.

Listen to the advice of others, but follow only what you understand and can unite in your own feeling. Be firm, be meek, but follow your own convictions. It is better to be nothing than an echo of other painters.

...Art itself may be defined as a single minded attempt to render the highest kind of justice to the visible universe, by bringing to light the truth, manifold and one, underlying its every aspect.

Be guided by feelings alone. Abandon yourself to your first impression. If you really have been touched, you will convey to others the sincerity of your emotion.

I hope with all my heart there will be painting in heaven.

You know, a landscape painter's day is delightful. You get up early, at three o'clock in the morning, before sunrise; you go and sit under a tree; you watch and wait. At first there is nothing much to be seen. Nature looks like a whitish canvas with a few broad outlines faintly sketched in; all is misty, everything quivers in the cool dawn breeze. The sky lights up. The sun has not yet burst through the gauze veil that hides the meadow, the little valley, the hill on the horizon... Ah, a first ray of sunshine!

I always entreat the good Lord to give me my childhood back, that is to say, to grant that I may see nature and render it like a child, without prejudice.