Robert Henri on Writing

August 26th, 2011 / 6:06 am
Craft Notes

Brooks Sterritt

Robert Henri on Writing

“The picture that looks as if it were done without effort may have been a perfect battlefield in its making.”

“The color of a background is not as it is, but as it appears when the artist is most deeply engaged with the figure in front of it. It is not seen with the direct eye.”

“If you look past the model at the background it responds to your appeal and comes forward. It is no longer a background.”

“The most beautiful art is the art which is freest from the demands of convention, which has a law to itself, which as technique is a creation of a special need.”

“The demand we so often hear for finish is not for finish, but is for the expected.”

“In drawing this outline you forget what the line signifies because your interest is in drawing the line only as a line. You must think more of what created the line in nature, of the movement and the form that created it. The line is nothing in itself.”

“Many an artist has fussed all day with a face, changing and changing and never getting it right because the fault should have been found in the background which he has neglected.”

“Every picture should have one big controlling gesture.”

“You can make hundreds of experiments on the glass of your palette the memories of which will sink into you to come into service in cases of actual need when at the work of painting.”

“Find out what you really like if you can. Find out what’s really important to you. Then sing your song. You will have something to sing about and your whole heart will be in the singing.”

Tags: Robert Henri, The Art Spirit

6 Comments

August 26th, 2011 / 4:42 pm deadgod—
August 26th, 2011 / 5:42 pm deadgod—
August 26th, 2011 / 6:47 pm shwardo—
August 27th, 2011 / 12:29 am deadgod—
August 27th, 2011 / 3:01 am Anonymous—
August 29th, 2011 / 12:31 pm Anonymous—

Robert Henri on Writing

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