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Quotes about art

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The world is a king, and like a king, desires flattery in return for favor; but true art is selfish and perverse — it will not submit to the mold of flattery.
Ludwig van Beethoven1770–1827Conversation book (March 1820)
Do not merely practice your art, but force your way into its secrets; it deserves that, for only art and science can exalt man to divinity.
Ludwig van Beethoven1770–1827Letter to Emilie, July 17, 1812.
- Science
Judges of elegance and taste consider themselves as benefactors to the human race, whilst they are really only the interrupters of their pleasure.
Jeremy Bentham1748–1832Théorie des peines et des récompenses (1811); translation by Richard Smith, The Rationale of Reward, J. & H. L. Hunt, London, 1825, Bk. 3, Ch. 1
- Clever Jabs
What is art but a way of seeing?
TBThomas Bergerborn 1959Often credited to Saul Bellow
Accordion, n. An instrument in harmony with the sentiments of an assassin.
Ambrose Bierce1842–1914The Devil’s Dictionary (1911)
- Comedy
- Music
Clarionet, n. An instrument of torture operated by a person with cotton in his ears. There are two instruments that are worse than a clarionet⁠—two clarionets.
Ambrose Bierce1842–1914The Devil’s Dictionary (1911)
- Comedy
- Music
Degrade first the arts if you’d mankind degrade,
Hire idiots to paint with cold light and hot shade.
William Blake1757–1827Annotations to Sir Joshua Reynolds’s Discourses, title page (c. 1798–1809)
The reason Milton wrote in fetters when he wrote of Angels and God, and at liberty when of Devils and Hell, is because he was a true poet and of the Devils’ party without knowing it.
William Blake1757–1827The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790–1793)
- Poetry
I must Create a System, or be enslav’d by another Man’s;
I will not Reason and Compare: my business is to Create.
William Blake1757–1827Jerusalem The Emanation of The Giant Albion (c. 1803–1820), Ch. 1, plate 10, lines 20-21 The Words of Los
- Freedom
Poetry Fetter’d. Fetters the Human Race. Nations are Destroy’d, or Flourish, in proportion as Their Poetry, Painting, and Music are Destroy’d or Flourish!
William Blake1757–1827Jerusalem The Emanation of The Giant Albion (c. 1803–1820)
- Music
- Poetry
We must be clear that when it comes to atoms, language can be used only as in poetry. The poet, too, is not nearly so concerned with describing facts as with creating images and establishing mental connections.
Niels Bohr1885–1962In his first meeting with Werner Heisenberg in early summer 1920, in response to questions on the nature of language, as reported in Discussions about Language (1933); quoted in Defense Implications of International Indeterminacy (1972) by Robert J. …
- Poetry
- Science
Poetry always remembers that it was an oral art before it was a written art. It remembers that it was first song.
Jorge Luis Borges1899–1986“The Divine Comedy”, lecture (1977), in Seven Nights (1980)
- Poetry
All that happens to us, including our humiliations, our misfortunes, our embarrassments, all is given to us as raw material, as clay, so that we may shape our art.
Jorge Luis Borges1899–1986Twenty-four Conversations with Borges, Including a Selection of Poems: Interviews by Roberto Alifano, 1981–1983 (1984)
- Experience
Saturate yourself with your subject and the camera will all but take you by the hand.
Margaret Bourke-White1904–1971
- Photography
I had to resign myself, many years ago, that I’m not too articulate when it comes to explaining how I feel about things. But my music does it for me, it really does.
David Bowie1947–2016Livewire interview (2002)
- Music