Best 22487 quotes in «art quotes» category

If we try to think back to the dim and distant past... what is it that helps us reconstruct those times, and to picture the lives of those who lived in them? It is their art... It is thanks to the hand, the companion of the mind, that civilization has arisen.

If we want to make meaning, we need to make art. Cook, write, draw, doodle, paint, scrapbook, take pictures, collage, knit, rebuild an engine, sculpt, dance, decorate, act, sing - it doesn't matter. As long as we're creating, we're cultivating meaning.

If we trace out what we behold and experience through the language of logic, we are doing science; if we show it in forms whose interrelashionships are not accessible to our conscious thought but we are intuitively recognized as meaningful, we are doing art.

If we will admit time into our thoughts at all, the mythologies, those vestiges of ancient poems, wrecks of poems, so to speak, the world's inheritance,... these are the materials and hints for a history of the rise and progress of the race; how, from the condition of ants, it arrived at the condition of men, and arts were gradually invented. Let a thousand surmises shed some light on this story.

If we wish to fight, the enemy can be forced to an engagement even though he be sheltered behind a high rampart and a deep ditch. All we need do is attack some other place that he will be obliged to relieve.

If we understood the enigmas of life there would be no need for art.

If we wish to unfold the mind in our children we do not leave them to their own uncultivated taste in all these things, but we try to help them to train that taste, whether it be in art, in music or in literature.

If, while I'm painting, I distort or destroy a motif, it is not a planned or conscious act, but rather it has a different justification: I see the motif, the way I painted it, is somehow ugly or unbearable. Then I try to follow my feelings and make it attractive. And that means a process of painting, changing or destroying - for however long it takes - until I think it has improved. And I don't demand an explanation from myself as to why this is so.

If what you want to do is make good art, decide whats good and try to imitate it.

If wrestling can be considered an art form, then [Ric Flair] is using oils, and the many others merely water colors.

If what is seen and experienced is portrayed in the language of logic, then it is science. If it is communicated through forms whose connections are not accessible to the conscious mind but are recognized intuitively, then it is art.

If what we want to do is promote reading and writing and publishing and making sure this is a business that keeps going - because it is a business! It's not just an art - then we have to take responsibility. I get sort of crazy and frothy when I think about this. It really matters.

If within the last century art conceived as an autonomous activity has come to be invested with an unprecedented stature - the nearest thing to a sacramental human activity acknowledged by secular society - it is because one of the tasks art has assumed is making forays into and taking up positions on the frontiers of consciousness (often very dangerous to the artist as a person) and reporting back what's there.

If women were by nature what they make themselves by art; if they were to lose suddenly all the freshness of their complexion, and their faces to become as fiery and as leaden as they make them with the red and the paint they besmear themselves with, they would consider themselves the most wretched creatures on earth.

If words were adequate to describe fully what the dance can do, there would be no reason for all the mighty muscular effort, the discomfort, the sweat and the splendors of that art.

If you are afraid of other people take a martial arts class. The best way to overcome fear is learn to be proficient in martial arts.

If you are a writer or any kind of artist, if you change something as fundamental as where you live - the way you live - then I think you change the very instrument that is trying to make the art

If you are close to a precipice, go away a bit; if you are far from it, come close a bit! Enjoy the safety, enjoy the view! Without safety, it is dangerous; without view, it is dull! Life is an art of adjusting the distances!

If you are a real perfectionist, you can't finish any job! We, the mortals, we don't have enough time to be perfectionist! Perfectionism is the art of immortals!

If you are good at in the art of finding consolation, it means that you have the best medicine after the disasters.

If you are handed something, it's a blessing and a curse. Look at hip hop artists, they produced everything themselves. Even people like Robert De Niro are getting into production. Again, it's art vs. marketing. Not everyone can take the risk. You have to break a few eggs to make a good omelet.

"If you are loyal you are successful," ruminated the company paper at one time. "All useful work is raised to the plane of art when love for the task-loyalty-is fused with the effort. Loyalty is the great lubricant of life. It saves the wear and tear of making daily decisions as to what is best to do. The man who is loyal to his work is not wrung nor perplexed by doubts, he sticks to the ship, and if the ship founders he goes down like a hero with colors flying at the masthead and the band playing.

If you are on Craigslist to get a sofa, and you see one for free. You think there’s something tragically wrong with it - maybe there are bedbugs. But if you see a sofa on there for $2,500, you think ‘oh man, that sofa must be amazing’. It’s the same thing with art - you set your own value.

If you are ready to die, then you are ready to live.

If you are situated at a great distance from the enemy, and the strength of the two armies is equal, it is not easy to provoke a battle, and fighting will be to your disadvantage.

If you asked central casting in Hollywood for somebody to play the role of President, they'd send you John Connally.

If you ask ... the man in the street ... the human significance of mathematics, the answer of the world will be, that mathematics has given mankind a metrical and computatory art essential to the effective conduct of daily life, that mathematics admits of countless applications in engineering and the natural sciences, and finally that mathematics is a most excellent instrumentality for giving mental discipline... [A mathematician will add] that mathematics is the exact science, the science of exact thought or of rigorous thinking.

If you buy a Cartier ring you want people to know it is a Cartier ring or a diamond, or a piece of art that's giving an emotion - then people read it and say, "wow that's really amazing". With prêt-à-porter you see people in the street, in a club, in a restaurant or whatever, and you think, "Oh my god, he's wearing my trousers!" In a way it's more open - people can put together the way they want - mixed with other designers.

If you can create a reality that is entirely fictitious, it doesn't owe anything to this stuff out here, but you interact with it on your own terms. I mean, if you took it to the point where finally you get, say, tactile feedback, so you were wired in in terms of the whole nervous system. The sensorium. You would have the ultimate art form. I mean, any painter would want it, any filmmaker would want access to it you know, any musician would want access to it. It would eliminate the need for the divisions between what we describe as the arts, converting the whole thing to experience.

If you can draw the stone rightly, everything within reach of art is also within yours.

If you cannot read all your books, at any rate handle them, and, as it were, fondle them. Let them fall open where they will. Make a voyage of discovery, taking soundings of uncharted seas.

If you can just focus on creating your art whether that's music or writing a book or painting trust me it is really hard to balance that with a personal life. You have to be willing to sacrifice sometimes things in your personal life if your ultimate goal is to pursue things as an artist.

If you cannot learn to love real art, at least learn to hate sham art and reject it.

If you can imagine the story of the world as a giant movie, to not have some understanding of the Bible - its story, its history, and its impact - would be like watching a great movie and removing part of the plot. It can't be done. The real truth is that everyone regardless of faith tradition benefits from knowing and understanding these aspects of the Bible. It enhances one's knowledge of literature, science, art etc. It's difficult to read any classic work of literature for instance and not see biblical allusions.

If you can say a thing with one stroke, unanswerably you have style; if not, you are at best a marchande de plaisir; a decorative litt

If you can shape your business life or your working life, you can just look at it as another extension - you just fulfill all your values as a human being in the work place. If you are an activist, you bring the activism of your life into your business, or if you love creative art, you can bring that in.

If you can see yourself as an artist, and you can see that your life is your own creation, then why not create the most beautiful story for yourself?

If you choose the sort of life which has no conventional pattern you have to try to make an art of it, or it is a mess.

If you change the rules on what controls you... you will change the rules on what you can control.

If you commit yourself to the art of poetry, you commit yourself to the task of learning how to see, using words as elements of sight and their sounds as prisms. And to see means to see something worth all the agony of learning how to see.

If you chase the art, you really can't fail because you'll always be able to look at yourself in the mirror. And that's not about making angry decisions, either, it's about always doing the right thing for you, your fans and your art.

If you consider yourself a part of the culture, then finances can't allow you to be bigger than the actual art form.

If you create your life with love, your dream becomes a masterpiece of art.

If you dance with your heart, your body will follow.

If you do not master the art of self discipline- you will succumb to the emotions and reality of regret.

If you fall asleep on horseback, the horse will stop by the rock. Art is a car. Kitsch is a horse.

if you don't exist in the arts of a culture, you're invisible. The arts are what express the soul of who we are and that expresses our humanity.

If you fail to take advantage of your enemies' collapse, they may recover.

If you do not start with the idea, you are creating fine art - its personal, but it tends not to communicate.

If you don't care about losing, you will focus on technique.