Visitor: Monsieur Degas, were there any of Monet's pictures at the Durand-Ruel exhibition? Degas: Why, I met Monet himself there, and I said to him, 'Let me get out of here. Those reflections in the water hurt my eyes!' His pictures were always too draughty for me. If it had been any worse I should have had to turn up my coat collar.

The air you breathe in a picture is not necessarily the same as the air out of doors.

I have been, or seemed, hard with everyone because I was carried away by a sort of brutality born of my distrust in myself and my ill-humor. I have felt so bad…

If I were the government I would have a special brigade of gendarmes to keep an eye on artists who paint landscapes from nature. Oh, I don't mean to kill anyon…

The European boys have small ideas but they sure know how to dress 'em up.

People call me an over-actor, people who say this might call Van Gogh an over- painter.

Bill is a good painter but he's a French painter.