Quotes by famous people, credited to who said them. Your own quotes must not match any of these. More are added all the time. 1,161,747 quotes Who coined it · How we decide
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Art
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“It is well to start by distinguishing the few really great – the major novelists who count in the same way as the major poets, in the sense that they not only change the possibilities of the art for practitioners and readers, but that they are significant in terms of the human awareness they promote; awareness of the possibilities of life.”
F. R. Leavis (1895–1978) first seen 1948 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Great Tradition: George Eliot, Henry James, Joseph Conrad (London: Chatto & Windus, 1948) p. 2
“It is not that I feel less weak, but Thou Wilt be my strength. It is not that I see Less sin, but more of pardoning love in Thee, And all-sufficient grace. Enough! And now All fluttering thought is stilled; I only rest, And feel that Thou art near, and know that I am blest.”
Frances Ridley Havergal (1836–1879) said by 1879 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Life without labor is crime, and labor without art is brutality.”
John Wesley Hardrick (1891–1968) first seen 1914 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Said in 1914 during an exhibit at Allen Chapel in Indianapolis; cited in William Edward Taylor, Harriet Garcia Warkel and Margaret Taylor Burroughs, A Shared Heritage, Indianapolis Museum of Art
“Philosophy and Art both render the invisible visible by imagination. Where Sense observes two isolated objects, Imagination discloses two related objects. This relation is the nexus visible. We had not seen it before; it is apparent now. Where we should only see a calamity the poet makes us see a tragedy. Where we could only see a sunrise he enables us to see”
George Henry Lewes (1817–1878) said by 1878 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is always understood as an expression of condemnation when anything in Literature or Art is said to be done for effect; and yet to produce an effect is the aim and end of both.”
George Henry Lewes (1817–1878) said by 1878 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The art of a great writer is seen in the perfect fitness of his expressions. He knows how to blend vividness with vagueness, knows where images are needed, and where by their vivacity they would be obstacles to the rapid appreciation of his thought.”
George Henry Lewes (1817–1878) said by 1878 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Art is the expression of the conviction that we can have a rational relationship with the world and each other. It isn't the faith or hope that we can, it is the demonstration that we can.”
Edward Bond (1934–2024) first seen 1976 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Programme note for We Come to the River (1976); cited from Lear (London: Methuen, 1983) p. xii.
“All spiritual strength for ourselves, all noble ties to one another, have their real source in that inner sanctuary where God denies his lonely audience to none. Its secrets are holy; its asylum, inviolate; its consolations, sure; and all are open to the simple heart-word, "Thou art my hiding-place.”
James Martineau (1805–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Six hours like this for a few francs. Belly nipple arse in the window light, he drains the colour from me. Further to the right, Madame. And do try to be still. I shall be represented analytically and hung in great museums. The bourgeoisie will coo at such an image of a river-whore. They call it Art.”
Carol Ann Duffy (born 1955) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“My mind has touched the farthest horizons of mortal imagination and reaches ever outward to embrace infinity. There is no knowledge beyond my comprehension, no art or skill upon this entire planet that lies beyond the mastery of my hand. And yet, like Faust, I look in vain, I learn in vain... For as long as I love, no woman will ever look on me in love.”
“My area of research is something that in all fairness has no practical usability whatsoever and the thing is I'm often asked to apologize for that. It is interesting to me that people ask 'what's the point of doing that if it's not useful?' But they never ask that, or do they very rarely ask that about art or literature or music. Those things are not gonna produce a better toaster.”
Lawrence M. Krauss (born 1954) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Well, then, Lord Jesus! I will creep if I cannot walk; I will take hold of Thy word. When I stumble, Thou wilt support me; when I fall, Thou wilt hold out Thy Cross, and help me with it to rise again, until at length I reach the place where Thou art, and with all my weaknesses, anxieties, and wants, cast myself into Thy bosom.”
Christian Scriver (1629–1693) said by 1693 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Any idealism is a proper subject for art.”
Lafcadio Hearn (1850–1904) said by 1904 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There is no unique, correct answer in most cases. It is a matter of taste, depending on the circumstances... and the particular age you live in. ...Gradually, you will develop your own taste, and along the way you may occasionally recognize that your taste may be the best one! It is the same as an art course.”
Richard Hamming (1915–1998) said by 1998 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I have nothing to teach you that will help you to make a living. [as art teacher, advising his students]”
John Sloan (1871–1951) said by 1951 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: In: Loughery, John. John Sloan: Painter and Rebel. New York: Henry Holt, 1995. , pp. 224-225
“She that would raise a noble love must find Ways to beget a passion for her mind; She must be that which she to the world would seem, For all true love is grounded on esteem: Plainness and truth gain more a generous heart Than all the crooked subtleties of art.”
George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham (1627–1687) said by 1687 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To His Mistress", cited from The Works of His Grace, George Villiers, the Duke of Buckingham (London: T. Evans, 1770) vol. 2, p. 138.
“The aim of my work: The study of nature, the love of nature's art,and the need to express what one feels in one's heart.”
Émile Gallé (1846–1904) said by 1904 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ecrits pour l'art, ed. Henrietta Galle Paris 1908/Marseille (1980).
“Avant-garde art has become habitual, a dead letter with little spiritual consequence, however materially refined.”
Donald Kuspit (born 1935) first seen 2003 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Reconsidering the Spiritual in Art", Blackbird (2003).
“Art was about creation. That was its soul, its essence. Creation and order. You took something disorganized—a splash of ink, an empty page—and you built something from it. Something from nothing. The soul of creation.”
Brandon Sanderson (born 1975) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“She let the world consume her. The familiar sound of pencil on paper, the focus of creation. Beauty was out there, all around. To create art was not to capture it, but to participate in it.”
Brandon Sanderson (born 1975) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“She didn’t exactly understand what she was doing, but she rarely did. Art wasn’t about understanding, but about knowing.”
Brandon Sanderson (born 1975) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Kaladin had never had much time for art. Either the picture depicted something useful—like a map—or it was basically pointless.”
Brandon Sanderson (born 1975) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“War was a masculine art, but when you started attacking women, you’d stopped engaging in war. You deserved anything that happened to you after that point.”
Brandon Sanderson (born 1975) first seen 1165 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Chapter 111, “Unchained” (p. 1165)
“A game of rugby is a work of art!”
Danie Craven (1910–1993) said by 1993 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Mathematical physics represents the purest image that the view of nature may generate in the human mind; this image presents all the character of the product of art; it begets some unity, it is true and has the quality of sublimity; this image is to physical nature what music is to the thousand noises of which the air is full...”
Théophile de Donder (1872–1957) said by 1957 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: as quoted by Ilya Prigogine in his Autobiography given at the occasion of Prigogine's 1977 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.
“The noble art of losing face may some day save the human race and turn into eternal merit what weaker minds would call disgrace.”
Piet Hein (1905–1996) said by 1996 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The production of a work of art is determined by the material and intellectual climate in which a man lives and dies.”
Hippolyte Taine (1828–1893) first seen 1865 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Philosophy of Art (1865)
“I cannot write anything about landscape without writing about the human figure and the human spirit inhabiting the landscape, for me, the whole art sculpture is a fusion of these two element – the balance of sensation and the evocation of man in his universe. Every work in sculpture is either a figure I see, or a sensation I have, whether in Yorkshire, Cornwall or Greece, or the Mediterranean.”
Barbara Hepworth (1903–1975) first seen 1966 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 'Studio International 171' – June 1966; as quoted in Voicing our visions, - Writings by women artists, ed. by Mara R. Witzling, Universe New York 1991, p. 280
“It's [the art-magazine 'Circle'] been reprinted and it's now referred to as classic. Well it is. But w:Ben Nicholson, Sir Leslie Martin, Gabo and Leslie Martin's wife, Sadie Speaight, and I did that. We were sitting round the fire and we said, 'Why shouldn't we do a book?'. And so we started and now it's a classic and referred to as such.”
Barbara Hepworth (1903–1975) said by 1975 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“As Chinese ambassador to the U.S., I warmly and sincerely welcome you and the American people to visit my country. With its long history and a vibrant future, and the perfect blend of art and science, China will not let you down.”
Qin Gang (born 1966) first seen 2021 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Global Nature of Science, Technology and Innovation: An interview with Ambassador Qin Gang, China's Ambassador to the U.S." in Science & Diplomacy (17 December 2021)
“Science, like art, religion, commerce, warfare, and even sleep, is based on presuppositions. It differs, however, from most other branches of human activity in that not only are the pathways of scientific thought determined by the presuppositions of the scientists but their goals are the testing and revision of old presuppositions and the creation of new.”
Gregory Bateson (1904–1980) said by 1980 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“These days there are painters that go inside a factory in order to be inspired by the noise of machines, so that it affects their works. Of course, artists need sensibility; sensibility towards their environment and their community, but when they are stirred enough by their experiences in their society they can create their art in small studios.”
Guity Novin (born 1944) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Seurat and Signac mixed paintings with the dry and abstract laws of science. This approach, in my opinion, usually strays from the purpose of art in general. Because it means that one cannot expect from an artifact, that is created with mathematical laws, to establish an improbable and irrational relationship between the work and the viewer.”
Guity Novin (born 1944) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When I stand before the throne, Dressed in beauty not my own, When I see Thee as Thou art, Love Thee with unsinning heart, Then, Lord, shall I fully know — Not till then — how much I owe.”
Robert Murray M'Cheyne (1813–1843) said by 1843 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The works of 'abstract' art are subtle creations of order out of simple contrasting elements.”
Jan Tschichold (1902–1974) first seen 1935 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Asymmetric Typography (1935)
“I do not think the coerced mind ever really learns an art.”
Poul Anderson (1926–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Art’s something you choose to make … it’s a bringing together of … of everything around you into something that makes you more human, more khepri, whatever. More of a person.”
China Miéville (born 1972) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Part of you understands without recourse to words, even if your higher mind asks questions in a format which renders an answer impossible." He looked at her triumphantly. "You too are the bastard-zone, Ms. Lin! Your art takes place where your understanding and your ignorance blur.”
China Miéville (born 1972) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Since this art surpasses all human subtelty and the perspecuity of mortal talent and is truly a celestial gift and a very clear test of the capacity of man's minds, whoever applies himself to it will believe that there is nothing that he cannot understand.”
Gerolamo Cardano (1501–1576) said by 1576 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Nature is inside art as its content, not outside as its model.”
Northrop Frye (1912–1991) first seen 1963 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Fables of Identity (1963)
“There is a curious law of art...that even the attempt to reproduce the act of seeing, when carried out with sufficient energy, tends to lose its realism and take on the unnatural glittering intensity of hallucination.”
Northrop Frye (1912–1991) first seen 1963 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Design as a Principle in the Arts”, The Critical Path and Other Writings on Critical Theory, 1963–1975, p. 232
“What if criticism is a science as well as an art? Not a "pure" or "exact" science, of course, but these phrases belong to a nineteenth-century cosmology which is no longer with us.”
Northrop Frye (1912–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Physics is an organized body of knowledge about nature, and a student of it says that he is learning physics, not nature. Art, like nature, has to be distinguished from the systematic study of it, which is criticism.”
Northrop Frye (1912–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In our day the conventional element in literature is elaborately disguised by a law of copyright pretending that every work of art is an invention distinctive enough to be patented.”
Northrop Frye (1912–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Popular art is normally decried as vulgar by the cultivated people of its time; then it loses favour with its original audience as a new generation up; then it begins to merge into the softer lighting of "quaint" and cultivated people become interested in it, and finally it begins to take on the archaic dignity of the primitive.”
Northrop Frye (1912–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Art is not simply an identity of illusion and reality, but a counter-illusion: its world is a material world, but the material of an intelligible spiritual world. (1:73)”
Northrop Frye (1912–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“One of the major activities of art consists in sharpening the edge of platitudes to make them enter the soul as realities. (p. 7)”
Northrop Frye (1912–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I don`t want the reduction of religion to aesthetics, but the abolition of aesthetics & incorporating of art with the Word of God. (p. 7)”
Northrop Frye (1912–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Under the stimulation of a "great age" or certain period of clarity in art a wider diffusion of genius becomes actual suggests to me that it is always potential. (p. 8)”
Northrop Frye (1912–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A community`s art is its spiritual vision. (p. 206)”
Northrop Frye (1912–1991) said by 1991 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source