“True Genius, like Armida’s wand,
Can raise the spring from barren land.
While all the art of Imitation,
Is pilf’ring from the first creation.”
‘Shakespeare’ (1762)
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Robert Lloyd (poet) 3
English poet and satirist 1733–1764Related quotes
As quoted in Hans Hofmann (2000) by James Yohe
1970s and later

Attributed without citation at The Art Story http://www.theartstory.org/artist-modigliani-amedeo.htm.

“Spring is Christ,
Raising martyred plants from their shrouds.”
"Spring is Christ" in Ch. 4 : Spring Giddiness, p. 37
The Essential Rumi (1995)
Context: Spring is Christ,
Raising martyred plants from their shrouds.
Their mouths open in gratitude, wanting to be kissed.
The glow of the rose and the tulip means a lamp is inside.
A leaf trembles. I tremble in the wind-beauty like silk from Turkestan.
The censer fans into flame. This wind is the Holy Spirit.
The trees are Mary.
“Painting is first of all the art of imitation, and not the servant of some imaginary 'purity”
as cited on Wikipedia: Maurice Denis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maurice_Denis - reference [42]
Nouvelles théories sur l'art moderne..., 1922

Discourse no. 6; vol. 1, p. 158.
Discourses on Art

“From haunted spring and dale
Edged with poplar pale
The parting genius is with sighing sent.”
Hymn, stanza 20, line 184
On the Morning of Christ's Nativity (1629)

“All the fairest things of earth,
Art's creations have their birth —
Still from love and death.”
(1836-2) (Vol.47) Subjects for Pictures. II. The Banquet of Aspasia and Pericles
The Monthly Magazine

“Religion and art spring from the same root and are close kin. Economics and art are strangers.”
"Four Letters: Escapism" first published in Commonweal (17 April 1936)
Willa Cather on Writing (1949)