Quotes from Auguste Rodin

Man's naked form belongs to no particular moment in history; it is eternal, and can be looked upon with joy by the people of all ages.

Art is the pleasure of a spirit that enters nature and discovers that it too has a soul.

To the artist there is never anything ugly in nature

What is commonly called ugliness in nature can in art become full of beauty.

There should be no argument in regard to morality in art. There is no morality in nature.

The realities of nature surpass our most ambitious dreams.

I grant you that the artist does not see Nature as she appears to the vulgar, because his emotion reveals to him the hidden truths beneath appearances.

Even with all the documents, you can never forge nature

The artist enriches the soul of humanity. The artist delights people with a thousand different shades of feeling.

There is no need to create. Genius comes only to those who know how to use their eyes and their intelligence.

I invent nothing, I rediscover.

I choose a block of marble and chop off whatever I don't need.

There are unknown forces in nature; when we give ourselves wholly to her, without reserve, she lends them to us; she shows us these forms, which our watching eyes do not see, which our intelligence does not understand or suspect.

Mere exactitude, of which photography and moulage [life casting] are the lowest forms, does not inspire feelings.

It is the artist who is truthful and it is photography which lies, for in reality time does not stop

To the artist there is never anything ugly in nature.

I choose a block of marble and chop off whatever I don't need.

Art is contemplation. It is the pleasure of the mind which searches into nature and which there divines the spirit of which nature herself is animated.

The artist must create a spark before he can make a fire and before art is born, the artist must be ready to be consumed by the fire of his own creation.

There are unknown forces in nature when we give ourselves wholly to her, without reserve, she lends them to us she shows us these forms, which our watching eyes do not see, which our intelligence does not understand or suspect.

To any artist, worthy of the name, all in nature is beautiful, because his eyes, fearlessly accepting all exterior truth, read there, as in an open book, all the inner truth.

There is a continual exchange of ideas between all minds of a generation. Journalists, popular novelists, illustrators, and cartoonists adapt the truths discovered by the powerful intellects for the multitude. It is like a spiritual flood, like a gush that pours into multiple cascades until it forms the great moving sheet of water that stands for the mentality of a period.

Nothing is a waste of time if you use the experience wisely.

Patience is also a form of action.