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The masterpiece should appear as the flower to the painter - perfect in its bud as in its bloom - with no reason to explain its presence - no mission to fulfill - a joy to the artist, a delusion to the philanthropist - a puzzle to the botanist - an accident of sentiment and alliteration to the literary man.

James Whistler

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James Whistler
Age: 69 †
Born: 1834
Born: July 10
Died: 1903
Died: July 17
Artist
Designer
Etcher
Graphic Artist
Illustrator
Lithographer
Painter
Printmaker
Writer
East Chelmsford
Massachusetts
James Whistler
J. A. MacNeill Whistler
James McNeil Whistler
James A. McNeill Whistler
James Abbott McNeil Whistler
Whistler
James Abbott MacNeil Whistler
J. McNeill Whistler
J. A. McN. Whistler
James Abbott Mcneill Whistler
James Abbott Whistler
jas. mcNeal whistler
J.M.N. Whistler
j. mcneil whistler
J.M. Neill Whistler
whistler j.m
Joy
Missions
Puzzles
Perfect
Accidents
Masterpiece
Botanist
Artist
Painter
Fulfill
Alliteration
Reason
Appear
Sentiments
Philanthropist
Men
Explain
Accident
Bud
Presence
Delusion
Puzzle
Masters
Literary
Bloom
Flower
Mission
Sentiment

More quotes by James Whistler

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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.
James Whistler
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A student of James McNeill Whistler tells the great artist, 'I tend to paint what I see.' Whistler replies, 'Ah! The shock will come when you see what you paint!
James Whistler
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You shouldn't say it is not good. You should say, you do not like it and then, you know, you're perfectly safe.
James Whistler
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Listen! There was never an artistic period. There was never an art-loving nation.
James Whistler
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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
James Whistler
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Industry in art is a necessity - not a virtue - and any evidence of the same, in the production, is a blemish, not a quality a proof, not of achievement, but of absolutely insufficient work, for work alone will efface the footsteps of work.
James Whistler
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I can't tell you if genius is hereditary, because heaven has granted me no offspring.
James Whistler
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It is for the artist... in portrait painting to put on canvas something more than the face the model wears for that one day to paint the man, in short, as well as his features.
James Whistler
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As music is the poetry of sound, so is painting the poetry of sight and the subject-matter has nothing to do with harmony of sound or of color.
James Whistler
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People will forgive anything but beauty and talent. So I am doubly unpardonable.
James Whistler
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If silicon had been a gas I should have been a major-general.
James Whistler
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Over and over again did the Attorney-General cry out aloud, in the agony of his cause, 'What is to become of painting if the critics withhold their lash?
James Whistler
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The world is divided into two classes - invalids and nurses.
James Whistler
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Work alone will efface the footsteps of work.
James Whistler
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A picture is finished when all trace of the means used to bring about the end has disappeared.
James Whistler
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If the man who paints only the tree, or flower, or other surface he sees before him were an artist, the king of artists would be the photographer. It is for the artist to do something beyond this.
James Whistler
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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.
James Whistler
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Paint should not be applied thick. It should be like a breath on the surface of a pane of glass.
James Whistler
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Art happens-no hovel is safe from it, no prince may depend upon it, the vastest intelligence cannot bring it about.
James Whistler
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Art is limited to the infinite, and beginning there cannot progress.
James Whistler