James McNeill Whistler - Art Quotes

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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 McNeill Whistler
Shall the painter then.... decide upon painting? Shall he be the critic and sole authority? Aggressive as is this supposition, I fear that, in the length of time, his assertion alone has established what even the gentleman of the quill accept as the canons of art, and recognize as the masterpieces of work. Seurat's painting of the Grande Jatte proved extremely influential.

James McNeill Whistler
Art is a goddess of dainty thought, reticent of habit, abjuring all obtrusiveness, purposing in no way to better others. She is, withal selfishly occupied with her own perfection only — having no desire to teach.

James McNeill Whistler
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 colour. The great musicians knew this. Beethoven and the rest wrote music — simply music; symphony in this key, concerto or sonata in that... Art should be independent of all claptrap — should stand alone, and appeal to the artistic sense of eye or ear, without confounding this with emotions entirely foreign to it, as devotion, pity, love, patriotism, and the like. All these have no kind of concern with it; and that is why I insist on calling my works 'arrangements' and 'harmonies.'

James McNeill Whistler
Listen! There was never an artistic period. There was never an art-loving nation.

James McNeill Whistler
Art happens-no hovel is safe from it, no prince may depend upon it, the vastest intelligence cannot bring it about.

James McNeill Whistler
For art and joy go together, with bold openness, and high head, and ready hand - fearing naught and dreading no exposure.

James McNeill Whistler
Art is limited to the infinite, and beginning there cannot progress.

James McNeill Whistler