Gustave Courbet

"..there's nothing harder in the world than making art, particularly when no one understands it. Women want portraits without shadow, men want to be dressed up in their Sunday best; there's no way out.…"

"I am fifty years old and I have always lived in freedom; let me end my life free; when I am dead let this be said of me: 'He belonged to no school, to no church, to no institution, to no academy, leas…"

".. painted the very people who had been present at the interment, all the townspeople."

"When I got back to Ornans, I spent a few days hunting. I quite like the subject of violent exercise.. .It makes the most surprising painting you can imagine. There are thirty life-size figures in it. …"

"The history of an era is finished with that era itself and with those of its representatives who have expressed it. It is not the task of modern times to add anything to the expression of former times…"

"The sea! The sea!.. ..in her growling fury, she reminds me of a of the caged monster who can devour me."

"In the coming year I must do a large painting which will definitely get me recognized for what I truly am, for I want all or nothing. All those little paintings are not the only thing that I can do.. …"

"I heard the comments of the crowd in front of the painting of 'Burial at Ornans', I had the courage to read the nonsense that was printed regarding this picture and I wrote this article.."