Paul Klee Quotes

To be a student of Stuck [1898 - 1900] sounded good. In reality, however, it was not half so splendid. Instead of coming to him with a sound mind I brought a thousand pains and many prejudices. In the realm of colour I found it hard to progress. Since the tone provided by mood predominated strongly in my mastery of form, I sought to find as much profit as possible here at least. And, in this respect, a great deal really was to be gained at Stuck's. Naturally I was not the only one, at this time, to be deficient in the realm of color. Later, in his monograph, Kandinsky passed a similar judgement on this school [of Stuck].

Color has taken possession of me; no longer do I have to chase after it, I know that it has hold of me forever.. .Color and I are one. I am a painter.

As time passes I become more and more afraid of my growing love of music. I don’t understand myself. I play solo sonatas by Bach: next to them, what is Böcklin? It makes me smile.

A line is a dot that went for a walk.

Things are not quite so simple with 'pure' art as it is dogmatically claimed. In the final analysis, a drawing simply is no longer a drawing, no matter how self-sufficient its execution may be. It is a symbol, and the more profoundly the imaginary lines of projection meet higher dimensions, the better. In this sense I shall never be a pure artist as the dogma defines him. We higher creatures are also mechanically produced children of God, and yet intellect and soul operate within us in completely different dimensions.

The father of the arrow is the thought: how do I expand my reach? Over this river? This lake? That mountain ?

Kandinsky wants to organize a new society of artists. I came to feel a deep trust in him [ Kandinsky ]. He is somebody, and has an exceptionally beautiful and lucid mind.

Franz Marc.. ..is more human, he loves more warmly, is more demonstrative.. ..I only try to relate myself to God, and if I am in harmony with God, I don't fancy that my brothers are not also in harmony with me; but that is their business.. .My fire is more like that of the dead or the unborn.. .Art is like Creation: it holds good on the last days as on the first.
What my art probably lacks, is a kind of passionate humanity. I don't love animals and every sort of creature with an earthly warmth.. .I tend rather to dissolve into the whole of creation and am then on a footing of brotherliness to my neighbour, to all things earthly. I possess. The earth-idea gives way to the world-idea. My love is distant and religious.

Art does not reproduce the visible rather, it makes visible.

Nature can afford to be prodigal in everything, the artist must be frugal down to the last detail.
Nature is garrulous to the point of confusion, let the artist be truly taciturn.

Color has got me. I no longer need to chase after it. It has got me for ever. I know it. That is the meaning of this happy hour.

What does the artist create? Forms and spaces! How does he create them? In certain chosen proportions.. .O satire, you plague of intellectuals.

Formerly it frequently happened to me that when questioned regarding a picture I simply did not know what it represented. I had not seen the subject, so to say. Now I have also included the content so that I know most of the time what is represented. But this only supports my experience that what matters in the ultimate end is the abstract meaning of harmonization (note from a letter, 1903)

Alfred Kubin, my benefactor, has arrived! He acted so enthusiastic that he carried me away. We actually sat entranced in front of my drawings! Really quite entranced! Profoundly entranced!

Tunis. My head is full of the impressions of last night's walk. Art-Nature-Self. Went to work at once and painted in watercolour in the Arab quarter. Began the synthesis of urban architecture and pictorial architecture. Not yet pure, but quite attractive, somewhat too much of the mood, the enthusiasm of traveling in it-the Self, in a word. Things will no doubt get more objective later, once the intoxication has worn off a bit.