"It seems to me that today, if the artist wishes to be serious — to cut out a little original niche for himself, or at least preserve his own innocence of personality — he must once more sink himself in solitude. There is too much talk and gossip; pictures are apparently made, like stock-market prices, by competition of people eager for profit; in order to do anything at all we need (so to speak) the wit and ideas of our neighbors as much as the businessmen need the funds of others to win on the market. All this traffic sharpens our intelligence and falsifies our judgment."
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Quote from Degas' Notebook entry c. 1860's; as quoted in Artists on Art: From the XIV to the XX Century, ed. Robert Goldwater (Pantheon, 1945)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Edgar_Degas
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Edgar Degas
Edgar Degas (19 July 1834 – 27 September 1917), was a French painter, print-maker and sculptor. He was moreover an active organizer of several Impressionist exhibitions, but never painted 'plain air' himself.
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