Art
Quotes on Art
There are painters who transform the sun into a yellow spot, but there are others who, thanks to their art and intelligence, transform a yellow spot into the sun.
Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) Spanish artist
Art is man added to nature.
Francis Bacon (1561-1626) English philosopher, essayist
What is a work of art? A word made flesh … a thing seen, a thing known, the immeasurable translated into terms of the measurable.
Eric Gill (1882-1940) British sculptor
Art is the imposing of a pattern on experience, and our aesthetic enjoyment in recognition of the pattern.
Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947) British philosopher
Art is I; Science is We.
Claude Bernard (1813-1878) French physiologist
If only we could pull out our brain and use only our eyes.
Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) Spanish artist
Great art is as irrational as great music. It is mad with its own loveliness.
George Jean Nathan(1882-1958) American critic
What garlic is to salad, insanity is to art.
Augustus Saint-Gaudens (1848-1907) American sculptor
To say that a work of art is good, but incomprehensible to the majority of men, is the same as saying of some kind of food that it is very good but that most people can’t eat it.
Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) Russian novelist, philosopher
If there were no other proof of the infinite patience of God with men, a very good one could be found in His toleration of the pictures that are painted of Him.
Thomas Merton (1915-1968) American author, clergyman
I would rather see the portrait of a dog that I know, than all the allegorical paintings they can shew me in the world.
Dr. Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English author, lexicographer
They are good furniture pictures, unworthy of praise, and undeserving of blame.
John Ruskin (1819-1900) English critic
Art is skill, that is the first meaning of the word.
Eric Gill (1882-1940) British sculptor
Painting consumes labour not disproportionate to its effect; but a fellow will hack half a year at a block of marble to make something in stone that hardly resembles a man. The value of statuary is owing to its difficulty. You would not value the finest head cut upon a carrot.
Dr. Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English author, lexicographer
To say of a picture, as is often said in its praise, that it shows great and earnest labor, is to say that it is incomplete and unfit for view.
James McNeill Whistler (1834-1903) American artist
Art consists of limitation. The most beautiful part of every picture is the frame.
G. K. Chesterton (1874-1936) British author
Art is either plagiarism or revolution.
Paul Gauguin (1838-1903) French artist
Without tradition, art is a flock of sheep without a shepherd. Without innovation, it is a corpse.
Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965) British statesman, writer
Art is dangerous. It is one of the attractions, when it ceases to be dangerous you don’t want it.
Anthony Burgess (b. 1917) British author
The English public takes no interest in a work of art until it is told that the work in question is immoral.
Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) Anglo-Irish author
Art does not reproduce the visible; rather, it makes visible.
Paul Klee (1879-1940) Swiss painter
Art is a lie that makes us realize the truth.
Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) Spanish artist
