Leonardo da Vinci
Quotations

"He who despises painting loves neither knowledge not nature."

 

"The merit of painting lies in the exactness of reproduction. Painting is a science and all sciences are based on mathematics. No human enquiry can be a science unless it pursues its path through mathematical exposition and demonstration"

 

"The eye sees a thing more clearly in dreams than the imagination awake."

 

"Iron rusts from disuse, stagnant water loses its purity and in cold weather becomes frozen; even so does inaction sap the vigors of the mind."

 

"You can have no dominion greater or less than that over yourself. "

 

"Learning acquired in youth arrests the evil of old age; and if you understand that old age has wisdom for its food, you will so conduct yourself in youth that your old age will not lack for nourishment."

 

"The part always has a tendency to reunite with its whole in order to escape from its imperfection. "

 

"The greatest deception men suffer is from their own opinions. "

 

"He who does not punish evil commands it to be done. "

 

"How from age to age the art of painting continually declines and deteriorates when painters have no other standard than work already done."

 

"When I get a little money, I buy books; and if any is left, I buy food and clothes."

 

"Masaccio was an excellent imitator of nature, universally acclaimed, an able composer, pure and unadorned: because he dedicated himself only to the representation of what is true: and to the perspective of his figures: he was certainly of greater skill and foresight than others of those times: and most able, being so young as to die at the age of twenty six."

- 1500

 

"That painting is the most praiseworthy which is most like the thing represented."

 

"I can execute sculpture in marble, bronze, or clay, and also painting in which my work will stand comparison with that of anyone else, whoever he may be."

 

"I have offended God and mankind because my work did not reach the quality it should have."

 

"It should not be hard for you to stop sometimes and look into the stains of walls, or ashes of a fire, or clouds, or mud or like places, in which you may find really marvellous ideas."

 

"Do not imitate one another's style. If you do, so far as your art is concerned you will be called a grandson, rather than the son of Nature. "

 

"O painter, take care lest the greed for gain prove a stronger incentive than renown in art, for to gain this renown is a far greater thing than is the renown of riches. "

 

"Men of lofty genius when they are doing the least work are most active. "

 

"Human subtlety will never devise an invention more beautiful, more simple or more direct than does nature because in her inventions nothing is lacking, and nothing is superfluous."

 

"Our life is made by the death of others. "

 

"While I thought I was learning to live, I have been learning to die."

 

"A gray day provides the best light."

 

"Look at light and admire its beauty. Close your eyes, and then look again: what you saw is no longer there; and what you will see later is not yet."