Hans Hofmann Quotes

Quotes about:

• The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.

  Hans Hofmann

  Inspirational, Business, Mean

  1967 Search for the Real.

  95 Copy quote

• In nature, light creates the color. In the picture, color creates the light.

  Hans Hofmann

  Light, Color, Energy

  "Readings in American Art, 1900-1975". Book by Barbara Rose, p. 117, 1975.

  262 Copy quote

• To sense the invisible and to be able to create it, that is art.

  Hans Hofmann

  Art, Able, Invisible

  Helmut Friedel, Tina Dickey, Hans Hofmann, Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus München (1998). “Hans Hofmann: Wunder Des Rhythmus und Schönheit Des Raumes : [exhibition at the Städtische Galerie Im Lenbachaus in Munich, from 23 April to 29 June 1997, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt, from 12 September to 2 November 1997 ]”, p.7, Hudson Hills

  18 Copy quote

• Our entire being is nourished by color.

  Hans Hofmann

  Color

  36 Copy quote

• A work of art is a world in itself reflecting senses and emotions of the artist's world.

  Hans Hofmann

  Art, World, Emotion

  Hans Hofmann, Sara T. Weeks, Bartlett H. Hayes (1967). “Search for the Real: And Other Essays”, p.59, MIT Press

  30 Copy quote

• Space expands or contracts in the tensions and functions through which it exists. Space is not a static, inert thing. Space is alive; space is dynamic; space is imbued with movement expressed by forces and counterforces; space vibrates and resounds with color, light and form in the rhythm of life.

  Hans Hofmann

  Light, Rhythm Of Life, Color

  Hans Hofmann, Sara T. Weeks, Bartlett H. Hayes (1967). “Search for the Real: And Other Essays”, p.66, MIT Press

  15 Copy quote

• It is not the form that dictates the color, but the color that brings out the form.

  Hans Hofmann

  Color, Form

  35 Copy quote

• Art is the expression of the artist´s overflowing soul.

  Hans Hofmann

  Art, Expression, Soul

  21 Copy quote

• Painters must speak through paint, not through words.

  Hans Hofmann

  Speak, Paint, Painter

  "It ls.", No. 3, Winter-Spring 1959.

  22 Copy quote

• The whole world, as we experience it visually, comes to us through the mystic realm of color.

  Hans Hofmann

  Color, World, Mystic

  "Search for the Real: And Other Essays". Book by Hans Hofmann. "Search for the Real in the Visual Arts", p. 45, 1948.

  15 Copy quote

• Art is something absolute, something positive, which gives power just as food gives power. While creative science is a mental food, art is the satisfaction of the soul.

  Hans Hofmann

  Art, Giving, Creative

  "Search for the Real: And Other Essays". Book by Hans Hofmann. "Painting and Culture", p. 56, 1948.

  22 Copy quote

• My aim in painting is to create pulsating, luminous, and open surfaces that emanate a mystic light, in accordance with my deepest insight into the experience of life and nature.

  Hans Hofmann

  Light, Energy, Painting

  "The Artist's Voice: Talks with Seventeen Artists". Book by Katharine Kuh, p. 128, 1962.

  20 Copy quote

• People say 'Hofmann has different styles'. I have not. I have different moods; I am not two days the same man.

  Hans Hofmann

  Men, Two, People

  7 Copy quote

• Art leads to a more profound concept of life, because art itself is a profound expression of feeling. The artist is born, and art is the expression of his overflowing soul. Because his soul is rich, he cares comparatively little about the superficial necessities of the material world; he sublimates the pressure of material affairs in an artistic experience.

  Hans Hofmann

  Art, Expression, Profound

  "Search for the Real: And Other Essays". Book by Hans Hofmann. "Painting and Culture", p. 56, 1948.

  16 Copy quote

• A thing in itself never expresses anything. It is the relation between things that gives meaning to them and that formulates a thought. A thought functions only as a fragmentary part in the formulation of an idea.

  Hans Hofmann

  Ideas, Giving, Function

  Hans Hofmann, Sara T. Weeks, Bartlett H. Hayes (1967). “Search for the Real: And Other Essays”, p.40, MIT Press

  18 Copy quote

• Through a painting, we can see the whole world.

  Hans Hofmann

  World, Painting, Whole

  20 Copy quote

• A work of art is finished, from the point of view of the artist, when feeling and perception have resulted in a spiritual synthesis.

  Hans Hofmann

  Spiritual, Art, Views

  Hans Hofmann, Sara T. Weeks, Bartlett H. Hayes (1967). “Search for the Real: And Other Essays”, p.63, MIT Press

  15 Copy quote

• Every art expression is rooted fundamentally in the personality and temperament of the artist.

  Hans Hofmann

  Art, Expression, Personality

  Hans Hofmann (1980). “Hans Hofmann, 1880-1966: A Special Exhibition of Major Paintings to Mark the Centennial of the Artist's Birth : December 13-January 13, 1981, André Emmerich Gallery, New York”

  13 Copy quote

• Art is magic... But how is it magic? In its metaphysical development? Or does some final transformation culminate in a magic reality? In truth, the latter is impossible without the former. If creation is not magic, the outcome cannot be magic.

  Hans Hofmann

  Art, Reality, Magic

  Hans Hofmann, Sara T. Weeks, Bartlett H. Hayes (1967). “Search for the Real: And Other Essays”, p.40, MIT Press

  21 Copy quote

• Nature's purpose in relation to the visual arts is to provide stimulus not imitation. From its ceaseless urge to create springs all Life - all movement and rhythm - time and light, color and mood - in short, all reality in Form and Thought.

  Hans Hofmann

  Art, Spring, Reality

  "Hans Hofmann". Book by James Yohe, 2000.

  11 Copy quote

• The truly monumental can only come about by means of the most exact and refined relation between parts. Since each thing carries both a meaning of its own and an associated meaning in relation to something else - its essential value is relative. We speak of the mood we experience when looking at a landscape. This mood results from the relation of certain things rather than from their separate actualities. This is because objects do not in themselves possess the total effect they give when interrelated.

  Hans Hofmann

  Mean, Giving, Landscape

  "Search for the Real: And Other Essays". Book by Hans Hofmann. "Excerpts from the Teaching of Hans Hofmann", p. 68, 1948.

  19 Copy quote

• I can't understand how anyone is able to paint without optimism.

  Hans Hofmann

  Passion, Optimism, Able

  "The Artist's Voice: Talks with Seventeen Artists". Book by Katharine Kuh, p. 119, 1962.

  8 Copy quote

• Being inexhaustible, life and nature are a constant stimulus for a creative mind.

  Hans Hofmann

  Nature, Creative, Mind

  "Hans Hofmann". Book by Cynthia Goodman, p. 103, 1986.

  14 Copy quote

• The impulse of nature, fused through the personality of the artist by laws arising from the particular nature of the medium, produces the rhythm and the personal expression of a work. Then the life of the composition becomes a spiritual unity.

  Hans Hofmann

  Spiritual, Artist, Expression

  "Search for the Real: And Other Essays". Book by Hans Hofmann. "Painting and Culture", p. 58, 1948.

  7 Copy quote

• The whole world, as we experience it visually, comes to us through the mystic realm of color. Our entire being is nourished by it. This mystic quality of color should likewise find expression in a work of art.

  Hans Hofmann

  Art, Expression, Color

  "Search for the Real: And Other Essays". Book by Hans Hofmann. "Search for the Real in the Visual Arts", p. 45, 1948.

  7 Copy quote

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