Hans Hofmann: Artist

Hans Hofmann was American artist. Explore interesting quotes on artist.
Hans Hofmann: 134   quotes 3   likes

“This two-way transformation proceeds from metaphysical perceptions, for metaphysics is the search for the essential nature of reality. And so artistic creation is the metamorphosis of the external physical aspects of a thing into a self-sustaining spiritual reality. Such is the magic act which takes place continuously in the development of a work of art. On this and only on this is creation based.”

Hans Hofmann

'Search for the Real in the Visual Arts', p. 40
Search for the Real and Other Essays (1948)

Art , Way , Search , Nature

“Every art expression is rooted fundamentally in the personality and temperament of the artist.”

Hans Hofmann

Quote in: 'Hans Hofmann' by Cynthia Goodman, in Portfolio (January - February 1981), p. 47
1970s and later

Art , Personality

“Creation is dominated by three absolutely different factors: First, nature, which works upon us by its laws; second, the artist, who creates a spiritual contact with nature and his materials; third, the medium of expression through which the artist translates his inner world. Of those three components only one, the medium, is material.”

Hans Hofmann

As quoted in Hans Hofmann (1963) by William Chapin Seitz, p. 15
1960s

World , Law , Nature

“My paintings are always images of my whole psychic makeup. You cannot deny yourself. You ask, am I painting myself? I'd been a swindler if I did otherwise. I'd be denying my existence as an artist. I've been also asked, what do you want to convey? And I say, nothing but my own nature... I am nothing but an optimist.”

Hans Hofmann

1960s
Source: Hofmann, in Ashton, (1960's) Twetieth Century Artists on Art, 218

Nature , Painting

“Painting is aesthetic enjoyment; I want to be a 'poet'. As an artist I must conform to my nature. My nature has a lyrical as well as a dramatic disposition. Not one day is the same. One day I feel wonderful to work and I feel an expression, which shows in the work. Only with a very clear mind on a clear day I can paint without interruptions and without food because my disposition is like that. My work should reflect my moods and the greatest enjoyment I had when I did the work…”

Hans Hofmann

Quote from 'Artists' Session at Studio 35', (1950); as cited in Abstract Expressionism Creators and Critics (1990), ed. Clifford Ross, p. 225 <!-- Abrams Publishers New York -->
1950s

Food , Feeling , Mood , Nature

“Basically I hate categorical labels. As a young artist I already was very clear about this — that 'objectification' is not the final aim of art. For there are greater things than the object. The greatest thing is the human mind.”

Hans Hofmann

As quoted in The Artist's Voice : Talks With Seventeen Modern Artists (1962) by Katharine Kuh, p. 118
1960s

Hate , Art

“A thought that has found a plastic expression must continue to expand in keeping with its own plastic idiom. A plastic idea must be expressed with plastic means just as a musical idea is expressed with musical means, or a literary idea with verbal means. Neither music nor literature are wholly translatable into other art forms; and so a plastic art cannot be created through a superimposed literary meaning. The artist who attempts to do so produces nothing more than a show-booth. He contents himself with visual story-telling. He subjects himself to a mechanistic kind of thinking which disintegrates into fragments.”

Hans Hofmann

'Search for the Real in the Visual Arts', p. 40-46
Search for the Real and Other Essays (1948)

Art , Music , Literature , Idea

“Dreams and reality are united in our imagination. The artist possesses the means to create only after he has effective command of his faculty of empathy which he must develop simultaneously with his imaginative capacity.”

Hans Hofmann

'Excerpts from the Teaching of Hans Hofmann', p. 61
Search for the Real and Other Essays (1948)

Dreams , Imagination , Reality

“The knowledge of reality, achieved by means of the complete sensory equipment, must be expressed artistically in terms of a medium which appeals to the memory of all sensory experience — but only through the eye.”

Hans Hofmann

'Search for the Real in the Visual Arts', p. 54
Search for the Real and Other Essays (1948)

Knowledge , Reality , Memory

“The general misunderstanding of a work of art is often due to the fact that the key to its spiritual content and technical means is missed. Unless the observer is trained to a certain degree in the artistic idiom, he is apt to search for things which have little to do with the aesthetic content of a picture. He is likely to look for pure representational values when the emphasis is really upon music-like relationships.”

Hans Hofmann

'Painting and Culture' p. 56
Search for the Real and Other Essays (1948)

Art , Music , Search , Training

“There is a world of visual beauty open to the one willing to undergo the practice and striving necessary to the understanding of its language.
This world is a important as culturally as is the world of words or of music. My ideal is to form and to paint as Schubert sings his songs and as Beethoven creates his world in sounds. That is to say, creation of one’s own inner world through the same human and artistic discipline.
An inner sensation can find external expression only through spiritual realization.”

Hans Hofmann

'Painting and Culture' p. 58
Search for the Real and Other Essays (1948)

World , Beauty , Music , Understanding

“The impulse of nature, fused through the personality of the artist by laws arising from the particular nature of the medium, produces the rhythm and the personal expression of a work. Then the life of the composition becomes a spiritual unity.”

Hans Hofmann

'Painting and Culture' p. 58
Search for the Real and Other Essays (1948)

Life , Law , Nature , Personality

“A glimpse heavenward at a constellation or even at a single star only suggests infinity; actually our vision is limited. We cannot perceive unlimited space; it is immeasurable. The universe, as we know it through our visual experience, is limited. It first came into existence with the formation of matter, and will end with the complete dissolution of matter.<!-- I TRIMMED this portion to simply cut down a little on quotes from this one essay. ~ 2009·03·21 02:36 Kalki} Where there is matter and action, there is space. Pictorial space exists two dimensionally. When the two dimensionality of a picture is destroyed, it falls into parts — it creates the effect of a naturalistic space. When a picture conveys only naturalistic space, it represents a special case, a portion of what is felt about three-dimensional experience. This expression of the artist’s experience is thus incomplete.”

Hans Hofmann

'Search for the Real in the Visual Arts', p. 40-48
'Search for the Real in the Visual Arts', p. 43
Search for the Real and Other Essays (1948)

Quotes , Star , Universe , Parting

“A work of art is a world in itself reflecting senses and emotions of the artist's world.
Just as a flower, by virtue of its existence as a complete organism is both ornamental and self-sufficient as to color, form, and texture, so art, because of its singular existence is more than mere ornament.”

Hans Hofmann

'Excerpts from the Teaching of Hans Hofmann', p. 59
Search for the Real and Other Essays (1948)

World , Art , Color , Flowers

“Art leads to a more profound concept of life, because art itself is a profound expression of feeling. The artist is born, and art is the expression of his overflowing soul. Because his soul is rich, he cares comparatively little about the superficial necessities of the material world; he sublimates the pressure of material affairs in an artistic experience.”

Hans Hofmann

'Painting and Culture' p. 56
Search for the Real and Other Essays (1948)

Life , World , Art , Feeling

“One must realize that, apart from considerations of color and form, there are two fundamentally different ways of regarding a medium of expression: one is based on taste only — an approach in which the external physical elements of expression are merely pleasingly arranged. This way results in decoration with no spiritual reaction. Arrangement is not art. The second way is based on the artist’s power of empathy, to feel the intrinsic qualities of the medium of expression. Through these qualities the medium comes to life... In this life, an intuitive artist discovers the emotive and vital substance which makes a work of art.”

Hans Hofmann

'Search for the Real in the Visual Arts', p. 46
Search for the Real and Other Essays (1948)

Life , Art , Color , Way

“The significance of a work of art is determined then by the quality of its growth. This involves intangible forces inherent in the process of development. Although these forces are surreal (that is, their nature is something beyond physical reality), they, nevertheless, depend on a physical carrier. The physical carrier (commonly painting or sculpture) is the medium of expression of the Surreal. Thus, an idea is communicable only when the surreal is converted into material terms. The artist’s technical problem is how to transform the material with which he works back into the sphere of the spirit.”

Hans Hofmann

'Search for the Real in the Visual Arts', p. 40
Search for the Real and Other Essays (1948)

Art , Idea , Nature , Problem