Quotes about beauty and appearance

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Claude Monet photo

“Among Troyon's paintings there are two huge ones; Return to the Farm is marvelous with its beautiful stormy sky. There is much windy motion in the clouds, and the cows and dogs are very good. In Going to the Market you see the mist at sunrise. It's superb and, most of all, very luminous. The wide space in View from Surennes is amazing. You feel you are really in the countryside.”

Claude Monet (1840–1926) French impressionist painter

1859 letter to Eugène Boudin, June 3, 1859; as cited in Rodolphe Rapetti (1990) Monet, p. 11
Monet wrote Boudin this letter just after he visited the 1859 Salon.
1850 - 1870

Claude Monet photo

“Since the appearance of Impressionism, the official salons, which used to be brown, have become blue, green, and red... But peppermint or chocolate, they are still confections.”

Claude Monet (1840–1926) French impressionist painter

Quote of Claude Monet (1909), as cited in: Sarah Walden (1985) The ravished image, or, How to ruin masterpieces by restoration, p. 67
1900 - 1920

Claude Monet photo

“For me, a landscape does not exist in its own right, since its appearance changes at every moment; but the surrounding atmosphere brings it to life - the air and the light which vary continually. For me, it is only the, surrounding atmosphere which gives subjects their true value.”

Claude Monet (1840–1926) French impressionist painter

Claude Monet, 1891; as cited in: National Gallery of Australia, ‎Michael Lloyd, ‎Michael Desmond (1992), European and American paintings and sculptures 1870-1970 in the Australian National Gallery, p. 75
1890 - 1900

Claude Monet photo

“It is beautiful here [in Etretat, Normandy], my friend; every day I discover even more beautiful things. It is intoxicating me, and I want to paint it all - my head is bursting.... I want to fight, scratch it off, start again, because I start to see and understand. I seems to me as if I can see nature and I can catch it all.... it is by observation and reflection that I discover how. That is what we are working on, continuously..”

Claude Monet (1840–1926) French impressionist painter

Quote of Monet, 1864 in a letter to his friend Frédéric Bazille; as cited in Monet's landschappen Vivian Rusell; Icob, Alphen aan de Rijn, The Netherlands 2010, p. 12
1850 - 1870

Claude Monet photo

“There at the moment in Honfleur... Boudin and Jongkind are here; we get on marvelously. There's lots to be learned and nature begins to grow beautiful... I shall tell you I'm sending a flower picture to the exhibition at Rouen; there are very beautiful flowers at present.”

Claude Monet (1840–1926) French impressionist painter

in a letter to Frédéric Bazille; as cited in: Edward B. Henning, Cleveland Museum of Art. Creativity in art and science, 1860-1960. (1987), p. 95
1850 - 1870

Claude Monet photo

“To me the motif itself is an insignificant factor; what I want to reproduce is what lies between the motif and me... Other painters paint a bridge, a house, a boat... I want to paint the air in which the bridge, the house and the boat are to be found - the beauty of the air around them, and that is nothing less than the impossible.”

Claude Monet (1840–1926) French impressionist painter

Claude Monet, in an interview, 1895; as quoted in: Paul Hayes Tucker et al. (eds). (1999) Monet in the Twentieth Century. London: Royal Academy of Arts/Boston: Museum of Fine Arts. As cited in: Steven Connor, " About There, or Thereabouts http://www.stevenconnor.com/aboutthere/aboutthere.pdf." talk given at the Catalysis conference on Space and Time, Downing College, Cambridge, 23rd March 2013.
1890 - 1900

Claude Monet photo

“I am weary, having worked without a break all day; how beautiful it is here, to be sure, but how difficult to paint! I can see what I want to do quite clearly but I'm not there yet. It's so clear and pure in its pink and blues that the slightest misjudged stroke looks like a smudge of dirt... I have fourteen canvases underway.”

Claude Monet (1840–1926) French impressionist painter

Monet's quote in a letter from Cote d'Azure to his second wife Alice Hoschedé, (ca. 1886): K.E. Sullivan. Monet: Discovering Art, Brockhampton press, London (2004), p. 55
1870 - 1890

Claude Monet photo

“Every day I discover
more and more
beautiful things.
It’s enough to drive one mad.
I have such a desire
to do everything,
my head is bursting with it.”

Claude Monet (1840–1926) French impressionist painter

Variant: Everyday I discover more and more beautiful things. It’s enough to drive one mad. I have such a desire to do everything, my head is bursting with it.

Sun Tzu photo

“When the enemy is at ease, be able to weary him; when well fed, to starve him; when at rest, to make him move. Appear at places to which he must hasten; move swiftly where he does not expect you.”

Sun Tzu (-543–-495 BC) ancient Chinese military general, strategist and philosopher from the Zhou Dynasty

Source: The Art of War, Chapter VI · Weaknesses and Strengths

Sun Tzu photo

“If your enemy is secure at all points, be prepared for him. If he is in superior strength, evade him. If your opponent is temperamental, seek to irritate him. Pretend to be weak, that he may grow arrogant. If he is taking his ease, give him no rest. If his forces are united, separate them. Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected.”

Sun Tzu (-543–-495 BC) ancient Chinese military general, strategist and philosopher from the Zhou Dynasty

"If his forces are united, separate them" is also interpreted: "If sovereign and subject are in accord, put division between them."
Source: The Art of War, Chapter I · Detail Assessment and Planning

Sun Tzu photo

“All warfare is based on deception. Hence, when we are able to attack, we must seem unable; when using our forces, we must appear inactive; when we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away; when far away, we must make him believe we are near.”

Sun Tzu (-543–-495 BC) ancient Chinese military general, strategist and philosopher from the Zhou Dynasty

Variant translations
A military operation involves deception. Even though you are competent, appear to be incompetent. Though effective, appear to be ineffective.
Source: The Art of War, Chapter I · Detail Assessment and Planning

Oscar Wilde photo

“What of Art?
-It is a malady.
--Love?
-An Illusion.
--Religion?
-The fashionable substitute for Belief.
--You are a sceptic.
-Never! Scepticism is the beginning of Faith.
--What are you?
-To define is to limit.”

Oscar Wilde book The Picture of Dorian Gray

Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray

Quentin Crisp photo

“Fashion is what you adopt when you don't know who you are.”

Quentin Crisp (1908–1999) writer, Actor
Yves Saint Laurent photo

“Fashion fades, style is eternal.”

Yves Saint Laurent (1936–2008) fashion designer

Variant: Fashions fade, style is eternal.

Bernard Mandeville photo

“This laudable quality is commonly known by the name of Manners and Good-breeding, and consists in a Fashionable Habit, acquir'd by Precept and Example, of flattering the Pride and Selfishness of others, and concealing our own with Judgment and Dexterity.”

Bernard Mandeville book The Fable of the Bees

Remark C, p. 69
The Fable of the Bees (1714)

G. H. Hardy photo

“Mathematicians have constructed a very large number of different systems of geometry, Euclidean or non-Euclidean, of one, two, three, or any number of dimensions. All these systems are of complete and equal validity. They embody the results of mathematicians' observations of their reality, a reality far more intense and far more rigid than the dubious and elusive reality of physics. The old-fashioned geometry of Euclid, the entertaining seven-point geometry of Veblen, the space-times of Minkowski and Einstein, are all absolutely and equally real. …There may be three dimensions in this room and five next door. As a professional mathematician, I have no idea; I can only ask some competent physicist to instruct me in the facts.
The function of a mathematician, then, is simply to observe the facts about his own intricate system of reality, that astonishingly beautiful complex of logical relations which forms the subject-matter of his science, as if he were an explorer looking at a distant range of mountains, and to record the results of his observations in a series of maps, each of which is a branch of pure mathematics. …Among them there perhaps none quite so fascinating, with quite the astonishing contrasts of sharp outline and shade, as that which constitutes the theory of numbers.”

G. H. Hardy (1877–1947) British mathematician

"The Theory of Numbers," Nature (Sep 16, 1922) Vol. 110 https://books.google.com/books?id=1bMzAQAAMAAJ p. 381

G. H. Hardy photo

“The mathematician’s patterns, like the painter’s or the poet’s must be beautiful; the ideas like the colours or the words, must fit together in a harmonious way. Beauty is the first test: there is no permanent place in the world for ugly mathematics.”

G. H. Hardy book A Mathematician's Apology

A Mathematician's Apology (1941)

G. H. Hardy photo

“A painter makes patterns with shapes and colours, a poet with words. A painting may embody an ‘idea’, but the idea is usually commonplace and unimportant. In poetry, ideas count for a good deal more; but, […] the importance of ideas in poetry is habitually exaggerated: '… Poetry is not the thing said but a way of saying it.' [In poetry, ] the poverty of the ideas seems hardly to affect the beauty of the verbal pattern.”

G. H. Hardy book A Mathematician's Apology

A Mathematician's Apology (1941)