Art quotes
22.1K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
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Browse quotes that often appear alongside art — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
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"Journalists justify their treachery in various ways according to their temperaments. The more pompous talk about freedom of speech and ‘the public’s right to know’; the least talented talk about Art; the seemliest murmur about earning a living."
"I collect art, and I drink wine... things that I like that I had never been exposed to. But I never said, 'I'm going to buy art to impress this crowd.' That's just ridiculous to me. I don't live my life like that, because how could you be happy with yourself?"
"On the night he died - he was twenty-seven - Basquiat had been planning to see a Run-DMC show. When people asked him what his art was about, he'd hit them with the same three words: "Royalty, heroism, and the streets."
"Art is science made flesh."
"The ultimate politeness in art consists of speaking only to those who are able to uncover and measure its relationships. Anything else is symbolic, and symbolism is merely transcendental imagery."
"The only work of art which succeeds is that which fails."
"Look out! Be on your guard, because alone of all the arts, music moves all around you."
"The artist is a kind of prison from which the works of art escape."
"Whatever may be our natural talents, the art of writing is not acquired all at once."
"Life is nothing until it is lived; but it is yours to make sense of, and the of it is nothing other than the sense you choose."
"Realism and art cannot live together."
"A great artist can change society because of the entertaining and mesmerizing quality of his or her art."
"I usually think of art as having a measurable content of nourishment, whether factual or emotional or whatever, and I try to make sure that whatever I do has as much nourishment as I can muster."
"Everybody has a direct view of the person "behind" the art, so there is going to be a certain amount of awareness of who is making songs. But I like paintings where you can see the brush-strokes."
"I think the benefits are tremendous, and the power of accessibility in art is one of it's most explosive and insidious attributes."
"Headline writing is an art form."
"As art reveals the artist more than the world, so you see yourself and what you are not in the mirror of another culture."
"I believe that while art is always beyond morality, it is never above it."
"I think life is the most important thing and you have to live that first and then you're art comes second."
"Music is more objective, I think, than a lot of art is, but a surprising amount of it is cultural."
