29 Michelangelo Buonarroti Quotes

Michelangelo Buonarroti quotes

1. Your lordship, only worldly light in this age of ours, you can never be pleased with another man's work for there is no man who resembles you, nor one to equal you ... It grieves me greatly that I cannot recapture my past, so as to longer be at your service. As it is, I can only offer you my future, which is short, for I am too old ... That is all I have to say. Read my heart for 'the quill cannot express good will.'

2. Ancora Imparo

3. Beauty is the purgation of superfluities.

4. I was never the kind of painter or sculptor who kept a shop.

   Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

5. If people knew how hard I had to work to gain my mastery, it would not seem so wonderful at all.

6. If you knew how much work went into it, you wouldn't call it genius.

7. As when, O lady mine! With chiselled touch The stone unhewn and cold Becomes a living mould. The more the marble wastes, The more the statue grows.

8. Caro m' e 'l sonno, e piu l'esser di sasso, Mentre che 'l danno e la vergogna dura: Non veder, non sentir, m' e gran ventura; Pero non mi destar, deh! parla basso

9. I live and love in God's peculiar light.

   Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

10. I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.

    Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

11. What good I have comes from the pure air of your native Arezzo, and also because I sucked in chisels and hammers with my nurse's milk.

12. The greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling short; but in setting our aim too low, and achieving our mark.

13. Criticize by creating

14. Painting is not my art.

15. The true work of art is but a shadow of the divine perfection.

    Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

16. What do you despise? By this you are truly known.

    Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

1. “The greatest artist does not have any concept Which a single piece of marble does not itself contain Within its excess, though only A hand that obeys the intellect can discover it.”

2. “Cruzimea n-are rost unde-i iubire si nici puterea unde-i umilinta; blandetea-nvinge orice-mpotrivire, ca veseli orice suferinta.”

3. “si zi de zi, mahnindu-l viitorul, la gandul mortii tresarind exulta si intre teama si nadejde tine pe cai imaginare sa-si ia zborul.”

4. “I am still learning." -Michelangelo late in his life.”

5. “Ce viclesug, ce forta si ce geniu, stapan ingrat, m-ar duce iar la tine, chip milostiv ce-n inima porti moarte?”

6. “Precious is sleep, better to be of stone, while the oppression and the shame still last; not seeing and not hearing, I am blest; so do not wake me, hush! keep your voice down.”

7. “Se duc genii si durere, mor cuvinte si placere, generatii sub tacere, fum in vant, sub soare umbra.”

8. “O night, O sweetest time, though black of hue, with peace you force all the restless work to end; those who exalt you see and understand, and he is sound of mind who honours you. You cut the thread of tired thoughts, for so you offer calm in your moist shade; you send to this low sphere the dreams where we ascend up to the highest, where I long to go. Shadow of death that brings to quiet close all miseries that plague the heart and soul, for those in pain the last and best of cures; you heal the flesh of its infirmities, dry and our tears and shut away our toil, and free the good from wrath and fretting cares.”

9. “You no longer feel the fear of a change of being and desire . . . The course of the hours lays not violent hands upon you ; necessity and chance guide not your steps ... I can hardly write without envy. --Michelangelo on the dead.”

10. “Iar razbunarea e aceasta: intrucat noi l-am ucis pe el, el asa mort cum este ne-a luat lumina si cu ochii inchisi i-a inchis pe-ai nostri, care nu mai stralucesc deasupra pamantului.”

11. “Anyone who follows others never passes them by, and anyone who does not know how to do good works on his own cannot make good use of works by others.”

12. “Lord, grant that I may always desire more than I accomplish.”

13. “The noble heart finds most in starlike eyes.”