The simplest subjects are the immortal ones.

To my mind, a picture should be something pleasant, cheerful, and pretty, yes pretty! There are too many unpleasant things in life as it is without creating still more of them.

I look at a nude. There are myriads of tiny tints. I must find the ones that will make the flesh on my canvas live and quiver.

When I've painted a woman's bottom so that I want to touch it, then [the painting] is finished.

The purpose of painting is to decorate the walls. Therefore it has to be as rich as possible

The only reward one should offer an artist is to buy his work.

Go and see what others have produced, but never copy anything except nature. You would be trying to enter into a temperament that is not yours and nothing that you would do would have any character.