Degas’s quote means that painting can seem easy when you do not know much about it. A beginner may paint freely without worrying about rules such as composition, perspective, or anatomy, which can make the work feel natural and fresh. Since they do not yet know the standards, even mistakes can sometimes look interesting.
But once a person learns more, painting becomes harder in a different way. They start to notice small errors, weak choices, and the gap between what they intended to make and what they actually made. So, even though knowledge brings more information in the mind, but it also brings more pressure.
In essence, the quote tells us that learning a craft makes you more aware of how much skill it really takes. It is not saying that learning is bad. It is saying that the more you know, the more carefully and thoughtfully you must work.
