"The painter must give a completely free rein to any feeling or sensations he may have and reject nothing to which he is naturally drawn."
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Quote collection
Lucian Freud quotes (page 2 of 3)
48 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"The task of the artist is to make the human being uncomfortable."
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"I want paint to work as flesh... my portraits to be of the people, not like them. Not having a look of the sitter, being them ... As far as I am concerned the paint is the person. I want it to work for me just as flesh does."
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"My work is purely autobiographical... It is about myself and my surroundings."
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"I always felt that my work hadn't much to do with art; my admirations for other art had very little room to show themselves in my work because I hoped that if I concentrated enough the intensity of scrutiny alone would force life into the pictures. I ignored the fact that art, after all, derives from art. Now I realize that this is the case."
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"As far as I am concerned the paint is the person. I want it to work for me just as flesh does"
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"The painter's obsession with his subject is all that he needs to drive him to work."
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"The character of the artist doesn't enter into the nature of the art"
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"The paintings that really excite me have an erotic element or side to them irrespective of subject matter"
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"When I look at a body it gives me choice of what to put in a painting, what will suit me and what won't. There is a distinction between fact and truth. Truth has an element of revelation about it. If something is true, it does more than strike one as merely being so."
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"I use the gallery as if it were a doctor. I come for ideas and help - to look at situations within painting, rather than paintings."
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"It is through observation and perception of atmosphere that he [the artist] can register the feeling that he wishes his painting to give out."
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"And, since the model he faithfully copies is not going to be hung up next to the picture, since the picture is going to be there on its own, it is of no interest whether it is an accurate copy of the model."
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"Losing as much money as I can get hold of is an instant solution to my economic problems."
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"I work from the people that interest me, and that I care about, in rooms that I live in and know. I use the people to invent my pictures, and I can work more freely when they are there."
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"A moment of complete happiness never occurs in the creation of a work of art. The promise of it is felt in the act of creation but disappears towards the completion of the work. For it is then the painter realises that it is only a picture he is painting. Until then he had almost dared to hope the picture might spring to life."
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"If all the qualities which a painter took from the model for his picture were really taken, no person could be painted twice."
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"The only secret I can claim to have is concentration, and that's something that can't be taught."
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"I think half the point of painting a picture is that you don't know what will happen... that if painters did know what was going to happen they wouldn't bother to do it."
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"I could never put anything into a picture that wasn't actually there in front of me. That would be a pointless lie, a mere bit of artfulness."
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