“There is one quality I find in all the artists I admire most – men like Masaccio, Michelangelo, Rembrandt, Cézanne. I mean a disturbing element, a distortion, giving evidence of a struggle of some sort... Great Art is not Perfect. Here the disturbing element comes in. It is instructive to know that Rembrandt copied Mantegna, whose art is the extreme opposite of his own. Why did he do so? Because he was conscious that his own art lacked the classical element. He was aware of the opposite, and that makes him greater.”

—  Henry Moore

Quote in 'Conversations with Henri Moore', J.P. Hodin, in 'The Observer', 24 Nov. 1958
1955 - 1970

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "There is one quality I find in all the artists I admire most – men like Masaccio, Michelangelo, Rembrandt, Cézanne. I m…" by Henry Moore?
Henry Moore photo
Henry Moore 44
English artist 1898–1986

Related quotes

Piet Mondrian photo

“Now the only problem is to destroy these lines also through mutual opposition... [note under his letter]: I think that the destructive element is too much neglected in art.”

Piet Mondrian (1872–1944) Peintre Néerlandais

Quote in his letter to Sweeney, 24 May 1943; as cited in Mondrian, - The Art of Destruction, Carel Blotkamp, Reaktion Books LTD. London 2001, p. 240
1940's

Fritz von Uhde photo

“The one whom I honor most of all is Rembrandt. Rubens and Velasquez painted better than Rembrandt, but he was the greatest of all painters because he was most powerful humanly. His grasp of all things was from within out. He had something that surpassed all other painters-a great humanity. He is perhaps the only one who could have painted the Christ.”

Fritz von Uhde (1848–1911) German artist

As quoted by Gustav Stickley (1911). The Craftsman http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/DLDecArts/DLDecArts-idx?type=article&did=DLDecArts.hdv20n06.i0027&id=DLDecArts.hdv20n06&isize=text, Volume 20. United Crafts, p. 631

John James Audubon photo
Charles Robert Leslie photo
Robert Rauschenberg photo
Marianne von Werefkin photo
Daniel Levitin photo
George Henry Lewes photo

Related topics