J. E. H. MacDonald Quotes

To paint from nature is to realize one's sensations, not to copy what is before one.

I have memories of the clearest crystal mountain days imaginable, when we fortunates in the height seemed to be sky people living in light alone.

It is the work of the Canadian artist to paint or play or write in such a way that life will be enlarged for himself and his fellow man. The painter will look around him . . . and finding everything good, will strive to communicate that feeling through a portrayal of the essentials of sunlight, or snow, or tree or tragic cloud, or human face, according to his power and individuality.

If the function of the artist is to see, the first duty of the critic is to understand what the artist saw.

Made a sketch later on the cabin verandah, but it was impossible to keep up with the changes. Oh the difficulties of mountain art for too little genius.

Snow and reflections were beautiful but transient effects and other difficulties were beyond me.

One felt that the mountains are not completed. The builders are still at work. Stones come rolling and jumping from the upper scaffolding and often from the chasms one hears the thundering as the gods of the mountains change their minds.