Art
183 quotes
Biography
"The coming extinction of art is prefigured in the increasing impossibility of representing historical events."
"Art is made by the alone for the alone."
"Scientific pictures are often not just about science. They may... have an undeniable aesthetic quality. They may even have been primarily works of art that possess a scientific message."
"Pop art is the inedible raised to the unspeakable."
"Art constitutes a minor free zone outside action, paying for its freedom by giving up the real world. A heavy price!"
"Importantly, in Europe the question of art has been inscribed into religious pictures since the Renaissance. Here the rise of art marked a turning point in the history of images which is foundational for art history. Pictures not only carried the names of artists, but displayed their personal views on religion. The practice of art began without a fixed concept of art. But it developed specific evidence that distinguishes works of art. The notion of art emerged in the heart of the religious picture, with the themes still remaining the same. In an evolving market, personal artistic style became a brand in its own right. In the French writings of the time, “art” is introduced with the term “science”, while “art” refers to craft. The concept of Poesia, used much later by Titian when referring to his own pictures with mythological subjects, had hitherto been the privilege of poets. Giovanni Bellini defended the “bella fantasia” against the expectations of his patrons, thereby initiating the era of art collections."
"Henry Letham: Bad art is more tragically beautiful than good art, because it documents human failure."
"There abides in nature a certain form of matter which, being discovered and brought by art to perfection, converts to itself, proportionally, all imperfect bodies that it touches. ...It rested on the indisputable appearance of an indefinite cycle of transformations, reproducing themselves in chemical operations, without either beginning or end."
"No work of art is worth the bones of a Pomeranian Grenadier."
"Art...has always been a polite form of terrorism."
"Major art does involve a kind of rightness which reveals what is wrong with art which does not possess this rightness. Aesthetic flaws in this sort of situation are akin to logical flaws, because it can be shown why they are not right in the context in which they occur."
"While our art cannot, as we wish it could, save us from wars, privation, envy, greed, old age, or death, it can revitalize us amidst it all."
"It's true that things are beautiful when they work. Art is function."
"So heißt unparteiisch sein für die Kunst nur: zur herrschenden Partei gehören."
"Now nature is not at variance with art, nor art with nature; they being both the servants of his providence. Art is the perfection of nature. Were the world now as it was the sixth day, there were yet a chaos. Nature hath made one world, and art another. In brief, all things are artificial; for nature is the art of God."
"Art isn't just technique, in any culture…it's also Content. It's understanding not just How, but also What, to express."
"Etenim omnes artes, quæ ad humanitatem pertinent, habent quoddam commune vinculum, et quasi cognatione quadam inter se continentur."
"The purpose of art is expression. Of course this short sentence raises many questions. By itself it is uninformative. One should specify what art can and cannot express. One should specify what art should and should not express. These questions cannot be answered without having some notion of the nature of man. Here it is presupposed that God created man as essentially a rational being. This implies that man’s most valuable expressions are rational and intellectual. Therefore, although man can express emotion, by screaming “Ouch,” art becomes more human and valuable in proportion to its intellectual content. This does not deny that excellent technique may express triviality, evil, and insanity. It asserts, however, that what should be expressed is rational and intelligent."
"The division between art and obscene pornography is a Western conception. There was no sense in Japan that sex or sexual pleasure was sinful."
"Wherever rights are denied the poor, the prophetic anger is turned not merely against the incumbent rulers but equally against the means society employs to gloss over its own mendacity. And foremost among these means is art. Catering to luxury and emphasizing only the beautiful, art denies the fact that wretchedness and destitution have a tight grip on the poor. This is the reason why the prophetic zeal turned against art, and not merely against the luxury of women and the pretentiousness of the rich."
"I do a bale of sketches, one eye, a piece of hair. A pound of observation, then an ounce of painting."
"The desire to be loved is really death when it comes to art."
"Bringing reality to life has at once been the problem and the promise of pictorial art."
"Art [...] should not attempt to set up idols; it should reveal existence as a reason for existing."
"Art reveals the transitory as an absolute; and as the transitory existence is perpetuated through the centuries, art too, through the centuries, must perpetuate this never-to-be-finished revelation."