Man Ray famous quotes

To me, a painter, if not the most useful, is the least harmful member of our society.
-- Man Ray

#Art #Our Society #Members

Of course, there will always be those who look only at technique, who ask 'how', while others of a more curious nature will ask 'why'. Personally, I have always preferred inspiration to information.
-- Man Ray

#Photography #Inspiration #Technique

A camera alone does not make a picture. To make a picture you need a camera, a photographer and above all a subject. It is the subject that determines the interest of the photograph.
-- Man Ray

#Cameras #Doe #Needs

I photograph the things that I do not wish to paint, the things which already have an existence.
-- Man Ray

#Photography #Wish #Paint

Each one of us, in his timidity, has a limit beyond which he is outraged. It is inevitable that he who by concentrated application has extended this limit for himself, should arouse the resentment of those who have accepted conventions which, since accepted by all, require no initiative of application. And this resentment generally takes the form of meaningless laughter or of criticism, if not persecution.
-- Man Ray

#Laughter #Criticism #Limits

Nature does not create works of art. It is we, and the faculty of interpretation peculiar to the human mind, that see art.
-- Man Ray

#Art #Mind #Doe

Oh, yes, I was a great retoucher. A retoucher is an esthetic surgeon !
-- Man Ray

#Surgeons

I believe in the relation between photography and music; And thats my inspiration.
-- Man Ray

#Photography #Believe #Inspiration

I do not photograph nature. I photograph my visions.
-- Man Ray

#Vision #Photograph

There is no progress in art, any more than there is progress in making love.
-- Man Ray

#Art #Making Love #Progress

I have been accused of being a joker. But the most successful art to me involves humor.
-- Man Ray

#Art #Successful #Accused

A creator needs only one enthusiast to justify him.
-- Man Ray

#Art #Needs #Justify

It has never been my object to record my dreams, just the determination to realize them.
-- Man Ray

#Dream #Determination #Records

An original is a creation motivated by desire. Any reproduction of an originals motivated be necessity. It is marvelous that we are the only species that creates gratuitous forms. To create is divine, to reproduce is human.
-- Man Ray

#Creativity #Desire #Creation

All critics should be assassinated.
-- Man Ray

#Should #Critics

I like contradictions. We have never attained the infinite variety and contradictions that exist in nature. Tomorrow I shall contradict myself. That is the one way I have of asserting my liberty, the real liberty one does not find as a member of society.
-- Man Ray

#Real #Liberty #Way

The streets are full of admirable craftsmen, but so few practical dreamers.
-- Man Ray

#Dreamer #Craftsman #Admirable

I am an economic person; I judge the amount of work involved with the amount of worth attained.
-- Man Ray

#Judging #Economic #Persons

Just as I work with paints, brushes, and canvas, I work with the light, pieces of glass and chemistry.
-- Man Ray

#Glasses #Light #Pieces

I am not going to be dictated to by the size of the camera. I use everything from an 8 x 10 to a 35-mm. But I don't use these modern cameras which break down all the time !
-- Man Ray

#Cameras #Use #Size

I have never painted a recent picture.
-- Man Ray

When I saw I was under attack from all sides, I knew I was on the right track.
-- Man Ray

#Track #Saws #Sides

I never knew what I was doing until I was done.
-- Man Ray

#Done

Personally, I have always preferred inspiration to information.
-- Man Ray

#Inspiration #Information

A certain amount of contempt for the material employed to express an idea is indispensable to the purest realization of this idea.
-- Man Ray

#Ideas #Realization #Certain

You don’t ask a writer what typewriter he uses.
-- Man Ray

#Typewriters #Use

If the affairs of the world were put in the hands of the screwball artists, it couldn’t be in a worse state than it is now !
-- Man Ray

#Artist #Hands #World

I paint what cannot be photographed, that which comes from the imagination or from dreams, or from an unconscious drive.
-- Man Ray

#Dream #Art #Imagination

To create is divine, to reproduce is human.
-- Man Ray

#Divine #Humans

Thanks to my effort in the last 40 years, there has been more paper and film wasted.
-- Man Ray

#Years #Effort #Paper

The tricks of today are the truths of tomorrow.
-- Man Ray

#Today #Tomorrow #Tricks

I paint when I cannot photograph.
-- Man Ray

#Photograph #Paint

Quote me as much as you like; as a matter of fact I don’t even mind if you misquote me !
-- Man Ray

#Mind #Matter #Facts

One of the satisfactions of a genius is his will-power and obstinacy.
-- Man Ray

#Mastery #Genius #Satisfaction

Cut out the eye from a photograph of one who has been loved but is seen no more. Attach the eye to the pendulum of a metronome and regulate the weight to suit the tempo desired. Keep going to the limit of endurance. With a hammer well-aimed, try to destroy the whole at a single blow.
-- Man Ray

#Eye #Cutting #Blow

An effort impelled by desire must also have an automatic or subconscious energy to aid its realization.
-- Man Ray

#Effort #Desire #Energy

I photograph what I do not wish to paint, and I paint what I do not wish to photograph
-- Man Ray

#Wish #Photograph #Paint

An original is a creation motivated by desire.
-- Man Ray

#Wise #Desire #Creation

In the same spirit, when the automobile arrived, there were those that declared the horse to be the most perfect form of locomotion.
-- Man Ray

#Photography #Horse #Perfect

Dada cannot live in New York. All New York is dada, and will not tolerate a rival.
-- Man Ray

#New York #Rivals #Tolerate

Reality is fabricated out of desire.
-- Man Ray

#Life #Reality #Desire