Quotes from Leon Battista Alberti

Painting contains a divine force which... makes the dead seem almost alive.

We must always take from nature what we paint and always choose the most beautiful things.

It is very rarely granted even to Nature herself to produce anything absolutely perfect in every part.

It was never shameful to learn from any teacher things that are useful to know.

I will never tire of recommending the custom, practiced by the best architects, of preparing not only drawings and sketches, but also models of wood or any other material. These... enable us to examine... the work as a whole... and, before continuing any further, to estimate the likely trouble and expense.

No art, however minor, demands less than total dedication if you want to excel in it.

When I investigate and when I discover that the forces of the heavens and the planets are within ourselves, then truly I seem to be living among the gods.

Beauty - the adjustment of all parts proportionately so that one cannot add or subtract or change without impairing the harmony of the whole.

The city is like a great house, and the house in its turn a small city.

Painting contains a divine force which not only makes absent men present, as friendship is said to do, but moreover makes the dead seem almost alive.

The greatest work of an artist is the history of a painting.

Painting contains a divine force which not only makes absent men present, as friendship is said to do, but moreover makes the dead seem almost alive.

Beauty: the adjustment of all parts proportionately so that one cannot add or subtract or change without impairing the harmony of the whole.

When I investigate and when I discover that the forces of the heavens and the planets are within ourselves, then truly I seem to be living among the gods.

A man can do all things if he but wills them.

nothing other than the harmony of the individual limbs and parts, so that nothing can be added or taken away without damaging it.

There is no art which has not had its beginnings in things full of errors. Nothing is at the same time both new and perfect.

I shall praise those faces which seem to project out of the picture as though they were sculptured, and I shall censure those faces in which I see no art but that of outline.

Men can do all things if they will.

A man can do all things if he but wills them.

Beauty is the adjustment of all parts proportionately so that one cannot add or subtract or change without impairing the harmony of the whole.