To know in order to do, that was my idea. To be in a position to translate the customs, the ideas, the appearance of my time, according to my own estimation; to be not only a painter, but a man as well; in short, to create living art – this is my goal.

In: 'Realist manifesto', Gustave Courbet, (1851); as quoted at 'Nineteenth–Century French Realism', The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Heilbrunn, Timeline of Art History - Realist Manifesto (1851)