Bernard Berenson

Bernard Berenson (June 26, 1865 – October 6, 1959) was an American art historian specializing in the Renaissance.

Quotes

 * Consistency requires you to be as ignorant today as you were a year ago.
 * Notebook (1892)


 * Florentine painting between Giotto and Michelangelo contains the names of such artists as Orcagna, Masaccio, Fra Filippo, Pollaiuolo, Verrocchio, Leonardo, and Botticelli. ... Forget that they were painters, they remain great sculptors; forget that they were sculptors, and still they remain architects, poets, and even men of science.


 * Can any mortal portray himself with words, as perhaps he can with chalk or paint? ... A gifted verbal artist may convey some coherent idea of a person he attempts to portray, but not likely an objective one.
 * (reprint of 1949 1st edition)


 * Taste begins when appetite is satisfied.
 * Quoted by Stephen Bayley in The Observer (28 July 2007)