“In our life there is a single color, as on an artist’s palette, which provides the meaning of life and art. It is the color of love.”

Marc Chagall

Photo: Marc and Bella Chagall, 1923, by Hugo Erfurth

Marc and Bella in Marc’s Studio.

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Giorgio Morandi (1890 -1964) was an Italian painter and printmaker.

“There is nothing more surreal, nothing more abstract than reality.”

Natura Morta, Giorgio Morandi

“Everything is a mystery, ourselves, and all things both simple and humble.”

The paintings of this artist are subtle still life arrangements of bottles, jugs, kitchen utensils, and bowls that are devoid of any extraneous detail. The artist would peel off labels to be able to concentrate on the form of the subject matter itself.

The Italian Painter in his atelier

“I believe that nothing can be more abstract, more unreal, than what we actually see. We know that… the objective world… never really exists as we see and understand it… has no intrinsic meaning of its own, such as the meanings that we attach to it.”

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“Each day I go to my studio full of joy; in the evening when obliged to stop because of darkness I can scarcely wait for the morning to come… My work is not only a pleasure, it has become a necessity. No matter how many other things I have in my life, if I cannot give myself to my dear painting I am miserable.”  (Adolfe-William Bouguereau)

Adolphe-William Bouguereau was at once one of the most reviled and one of the most beloved of French artists by the time of his death in 1905. He was a favourite of collectors, who thought that his paintings were a fountain of eternal beauty far from contemporary life. His productivity was enormous. As a result he painted close to seven hundred works during his long life.

NYMPHES ET SATYRE

William Adolphe Bouguereau (1825-1905)
Nymphes et Satyre
1873

The painting shows four women/nymphs  (three more at the background) of the woods have caught a goat-faced satyr at a disadvantage. They are pulling him into the water by the arms, the ears and the horns.

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“When…I see the strange plants of exotic lands, it seems to me that I enter into a dream.”

Henri Rousseau (1844-1910)

Henri Rousseau one of France’s best realist painters?

It is very funny that Rousseau painted all these exotic landscapes while he never actually left France. He painted from his own imagination. His best and most well known works portray the exotic nature of wild animals and foliage in the jungle.

Rousseau considered himself a realist painter, many critics of that time however did not agree, he was mocked and only after his death public opinion began to change and his popularity grew.

The Dream

A long awaited success during his lifetime was the painting “The Dream” He exhibited this painting in 1910 at the Salon des Independants and received the acknowledgment he always longed for.

The dream by Henri Rousseau

Personally I love Rousseau’s paintings very much. I do not believe they are very realistic but they lead me into a fantastic, dreamy and exotic world where people and animals can live together in peace.

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“Everyone discusses my art and pretends to understand, as if it were necessary to understand, when it is simply necessary to love.”
Claude Monet

Palazzo da Mula in Venice 1908

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“An artist must never be a prisoner. Prisoner? An artist should never be a prisoner of himself, prisoner of style, prisoner of reputation, prisoner of success, etc.”
Henri Matisse

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“Although the dream is a very strange phenomenon and an inexplicable mystery, far more inexplicable is the mystery and aspect our minds confer on certain objects and aspects of life.”
Giorgio de Chirico

Painting: The two Sisters – (the Jewish Angel)

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I wish I could do whatever I liked behind the curtain of “madness”. Then: I’d arrange flowers, all day long, I’d paint; pain, love and tenderness, I would laugh as much as I feel like at the stupidity of others, and they would all say: “Poor thing, she’s crazy!” (Above all I would laugh at my own stupidity.) I would build my world which while I lived, would be in agreement with all the worlds. The day, or the hour, or the minute that I lived would be mine and everyone else’s – my madness would not be an escape from “reality”.” 
― Frida Kahlo

Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird, was painted by Frida Kahlo in 1940.

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“Colour is the key. The eye is the hammer. The soul is the piano with its many chords. The artist is the hand that, by touching this or that key, sets the soul vibrating automatically.”

Wassily Kandinsky

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“And even this heart of mine has something artificial. The dancers have sewn it into a bag of pink satin, pink satin slightly faded, like their dancing shoes.”
― Edgar Degas (1834-1917)

The Entrance of the Masked Dancers, c. 1884.

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