British Artist Quotes

Verbal representations of such places or scenes may, or may not, have the merit of accuracy; but photographic presentments of them will be accepted by posterity with an undoubting faith.

Alexander Gardner (photographer)

Only an open mind is big enough to contain the secrets of the universe.

Vera Stanley Alder

Cezanne was fated, as his passion was immense, to be immensely neglected, immensely misunderstood, and now, I think, immensely overrated.

Writers were a strange sort; I knew that much from the newspapers.

Chris Priestley

There are self-styled "anarcho-capitalists" (not to be confused with anarchists of any persuasion), who want the state abolished as a regulator of capitalism, and government handed over to capitalists.

To the inhabitants of Warsaw - We wage war only against hostile troops, NOT against peaceful citizens.

Words and Deeds. Cartoon Caption

Although the great revolution of 1793 changed the whole face of France both politically and socially, it failed to emancipate the twin arts of painting and literature. In each case one tradition was succeeded by another, and nearly forty years elapsed before the new spirit completely broke through the barriers set up by a past generation.

Wynford Dewhurst

I like the philosophy of the sandwich, as it were. It typifies my attitude to life, really. It's all there, it's fun, it looks good, and you don't have to wash up afterwards.

A death was more than an ending; it was like pulling a thread from a richly patterned cloth.

Jerusalem is all about a very special relationship between the ground and the sky. This work attempts to bring the two together.
- India-born artist sculpts landmark symbol for museum.

The magic of photography is metaphysical. What you see in the photograph isn't what you saw at the time. The real skill of photography is organized visual lying.

Terence Donovan (photographer)

The principal thing is the question of how our culture views age: that old is ugly Just think of Rodin, how he dealt with people of all ages. I have the feeling that I'm alive, I have a body I can make it extremely interesting. That keeps me alive and vital. It's a kind of process of energizing myself by my belief that the classical tradition of art that we've inherited from the Greeks is a load of bullshit.

Stories twist and turn and grow and meet and give birth to other stories. Here and there, one story touches another, and a familiar character, sometimes the hero, walks over the bridge from one story into another.

Marcus Sedgwick

I could never bear to be buried with people to whom I had not been introduced.

Norman Parkinson

The wind is the appalling enemy. It is mind-destroying, physically-destroying, soul-destroying....

Chris Bonington

A diner having a row with a waiter in a swanky restaurant chills the blood in a way that a quarrel over a pizza order elsewhere would never do. Compassion is rarely the custom of the privileged.

Somewhere on a hill facing the sea, there is a very beautiful ancient stone, and it's not going anywhere. It will be there, waiting for me.

George: One man naked is a male study; more than one, well... that's quite serious - two men naked are more naked than one.

Gilbert & George

The last hour from midnight had lost half its quarters, and the stars went lifting up the great minutes...

Clemence Housman

Almost anything that can be praised or advocated has been put to some disgusting use. There is no principle, however immaculate, that has not had its compromising manipulator.

This century has needed witnesses more than it has needed artists. The camera asserts what it has seen. The artists are just looking.

I am a simple man and I use simple materials: Ivory Black, Vermilion, Prussian Blue, Yellow Ochre, Flake White and no medium. That's all I've ever used in my paintings.

I mean by a picture a beautiful romantic dream of something that never was, never will be - in a light better than any light that ever shone - in a land no one can define, or remember, only desire

Edward Burne-Jones

Everyone has a certain difficulty in growing up, even my children, although I've been a good mother. I'm still not grown up in some ways compared with other people I know.

Angelica Garnett

John asked me to dance and I nearly died. Bingo! I then amazed myself by being very cool, calm and collected outwardly-inside I was out of this world. The dance was slow and smoochy. I was aloof and John, I think, was slightly embarrassed. It was all very painful and beautiful at the same time. The remaining students were looking on with puzzled expressions at such an unlikely combination.