What a simple thing death is, just as simple as the falling of an autumn leaf.

Love a friend, love a wife, something, whatever you like, but one must love with a lofty and serious intimate sympathy, with strength, with intelligence, and one must always try to know deeper, better, and more.

I am astonished at the high prices paid for works by painters who are dead, prices none of them could expect when they were alive. It is a kind of tulip trade, in which living painters suffer but do not profit.

We take death to reach a star

I'm now painting with all the elan of a Marseillais eating soup, which won't surprise you when I tell you I'm painting large sunflowers. The idea? To decorate the studio, now there's hope of Gauguin living here. I aim at a dozen panels of sunflowers in the room I've set aside for Gauguin.

Well, do you know what I hope for, once I allow myself to begin to hope? [...] That you find in your love for people something not only to work for, but to comfort and restore you when there is a need.

There is nothing more beautiful than nature early in the morning.