Top 100 Art About Quotes
#1. John Baldessari, the 79-year-old conceptualist, has spent more than four decades making laconic, ironic conceptual art-about-art, both good and bad.
Jerry Saltz
#2. The difference between art about death and actual death is that one's a celebration and the other's a dull fact.
Damien Hirst
#3. More and more in the art world are becoming moralistic, telling artists and critics what they should and shouldn't write, do, or make art about. Never mind the intellectual hypocrisy of this: Those who violate the clublike code are made out to be wrong, immoral, corrupt.
Jerry Saltz
#4. I didn't want make art about the internet at all. It's a really hard subject to take on and I did not set out to do that. But, it was real and it was what was happening.
Erika M. Anderson
#5. The thing about architecture is that it's an art [you] simply learn more by doing more. It's one of those things that is really not an art about thinking, but doing. So in a way, what it has done is greatly intensify the way that I build.
David Adjaye
#6. Like most sensible people, you probably lost interest in modern art about the time that Julian Schnabel was painting broken pieces of the crockery that his wife had thrown at him for painting broken pieces of crockery instead of painting the bathroom and hall.
P. J. O'Rourke
#7. You know, you become an artist, you become an observer, of life, and you digest life by making art about it.
Liz Phair
#8. I haven't made art about Israel. There's a covert subtext of Jewish identity in my artwork.
Jill Soloway
#9. I think that nudity is beautiful. Sometimes it can be awful, but when it's beautiful? Cinema is the art about reality; it's art from reality. In French we say l'art de la realite. You show reality, so you have to show bodies.
Lea Seydoux
#10. Isn't art about breaking rules, about challenging existing systems, isn't it about discovering meaning in things or situations before others see anything in them??
Peter Lindbergh
#11. It seems to me that the arts are rather flourishing. There's an awful lot of bad art about because of this, but that's true of every great era. I'm sure there was a lot dreadful art in the Renaissance that we fortunately don't see today.
Louis Auchincloss
#12. The greatest work of art about New York? The question seems nebulous. The city's magic and majesty are distilled in the photographs of Alfred Stieglitz and Paul Strand.
Jerry Saltz
#13. You never know what you can handle until if comes time to handle it. The less you think about it the better you'll handle it.
Art Hochberg
#14. He destroys that he might build; for when He is about to rear His sacred temple in us, He first totally razes that vain and pompous edifice, which human art and power had erected, and from its horrible ruins a new structure is formed, by His power only.
Jeanne Marie Bouvier De La Motte Guyon
#15. I answer, Socrates, that rhetoric is the art of persuasion in courts of law and other assemblies, as I was just now saying, and about the just and unjust.
Gorgias
#16. When you are learning about a martial art, it is about respect.
Jackie Chan
#17. It has taken me years of struggle, hard work, and research to learn to make one simple gesture, and I know enough about the art of writing to realize that it would take as many years of concentrated effort to write one simple, beautiful sentence.
Isadora Duncan
#18. Yes, I believe that the art of winning is through intimidation, and not necessarily do you have to speak about it.
Mark Spitz
#19. I wanted to open the dialogue about race in ballet and bring more people in. It's just beautiful to see the interest that has exploded for such an incredible art form that I will forever be grateful to!
Misty Copeland
#20. ... That little narrative is an example of the mathematician's art: asking simple and elegant questions about our imaginary creations, and crafting satisfying and beautiful explanations. There is really nothing else quite like this realm of pure idea; it's fascinating, it's fun, and it's free!
Paul Lockhart
#21. I had no special training at all; I am completely self taught. I don't fit the mold of a visual arts designer or a graphic designer. I just had a strong concept about what a game designer is. Someone who designs projects to make people happy. That's a game designer's purpose.
Toru Iwatani
#22. Because I'm an art historian, I have some experience of writing that comes out of close attention. That's what really art history is. You're looking at something very closely, and you try to write in a meticulous way about it.
Teju Cole
#23. I always think of my films within the context of where aesthetics meet economics. That's the nature of making art - not being naive about what is possible and getting what you need to tell the story you want to tell.
Ira Sachs
#24. Making music and art is about expressing something that's universally human, maybe even beyond human, at best.
Cass McCombs
#25. She works on her never-ending project for hours at a time. In art school they talked about day jobs in tones of horror. She never would have imagined that her day job would be the calmest and least cluttered part of her life.
Emily St. John Mandel
#26. It's not about becoming a movie star. It's about the down-in-the-dirt art of inhabiting the person you aspire to be while carrying on your shoulders the uncertain and hungry man you know you are.
Cheryl Strayed
#27. The job of the artist is to make a gesture and really show people what their potential is. It's not about the object, and it's not about the image; it's about the viewer. That's where the art happens.
Jeff Koons
#28. I remember saying to myself, those things are very, very important to hear, but there must be another way to say them so that they will truly be heard. I mean, that's what art is. Art is about being provocative; art is also about beauty and if you leave the latter out, the former doesn't matter.
Nikky Finney
#29. Always make your work be personal. And, you never have to lie ... There is something we know that's connected with beauty and truth. There is something ancient. We know that art is about beauty, and therefore it has to be about truth.
Francis Ford Coppola
#30. Everything he's learned about the Civil Service tells him that having tea poured for you is one of the ferociously guarded signifiers of rank, like the grade of paintings from the Government Art Collection hung on your office wall, or the quality of your carpet.
Charles Stross
#31. The default mode of modern writing about art is to despise any notion of singularity as so much overheated genius-fetishism.
Simon Schama
#32. I think that the most important requirement is to capture the essence of a piece of art. You look at it, essentially absorb it, and you have to be able to understand it visually without having to think about how it was done. I was already able to do that as a child.
Wolfgang Beltracchi
#33. Make your life your art. It doesn't have to be that you're an artist. I know I talk about art a lot, but I mean a very broad thing with that. You could be a veterinarian, that's your art. Find your art; find your thing you love.
Gerard Way
#34. One thing that took a while to really adjust to was, you do it for the the art, for the money, for being together and having a good time, but you do it for all those people out there who really care about the show. We are now talking about a show we did over 20 years ago.
Steve Kanaly
#35. Indeed the three prophecies about the death of individual art are, in their different ways, those of Hegel, Marx, and Freud. I don't see any way of getting beyond those prophecies.
Harold Bloom
#36. With its shrewd analysis and its knowledgeable reflections on the state of the arts, as well as a rich array of anecdotes and quotations about patronage, Patronizing the Arts will appeal to a broad audience.
Jonathan Culler
#37. I'm really inspired by the interplay of visual art and music, a total artistic environment where there's sound and visuals. When I think about that I get stimulated and excited. It's a feeling that you can't label with words.
Black Francis
#39. Everyone knows of the talking artists. Throughout all of the known history of the world they have gathered in rooms and talked. They talk of art and are passionately,almost feverishly, in earnest about it. They think it matters much more than it does.
Sherwood Anderson
#40. Genuinely great humour recognises the world it's describing and yet we are also called into question by it. That's what great art should do. That's what great philosophy should do. The one thing about humour is that this is an everyday practice that does this.
Simon Critchley
#41. We need to think about encryption not as this sort of arcane, black art. It's a basic protection.
Edward Snowden
#42. Celebrate your life now, as it unfolds.
Turn away from judgement and negative theories about your worth, your potential, and your destiny. See what you already have.
Danny Gregory
#43. The most useful thing about art is it's uselessness.
Tom Robbins
#44. I know this is insane, but I somehow wish I had been in Auschwitz with my parents so I could really know what they lived through! I guess it's some kind of guilt about having had an easier life than they did.
Art Spiegelman
#45. I was always an artist. I was a broker to earn a living, but I was always thinking about my art.
Jeff Koons
#46. People assume that artists must talk about art and beauty and the sublime whenever we get together, but no, we usually talk about money.
Christopher Bram
#47. Then I sit down, work at it, because now I have a convincing feeling about what that place wants to be, you see? And it's not just me. Me and my talent comes in taking that consensus and then making something wonderful out of it - a work of art.
Lawrence Halprin
#48. DJ-ing itself is not just about playing songs. The art of DJ-ing is presenting new songs to the crowd that they haven't heard before and creating a party vibe that's different than just listening to anybody's playlist. It's the only way to truly be big and respected in your craft.
TyDi
#49. The novel is always pop art, and the novel is always dying. That's the only way it stays alive. It does really die. I've been thinking about that a lot.
Leslie Fiedler
#50. My job is art curator, not artist. All I have ever wanted to do is immerse myself in art, to enjoy it, to learn about it, to write about it, to talk to others about it.
Hans Ulrich Obrist
#51. When I make art, I think about its ability to connect with others, to bring them into the process.
Jim Hodges
#52. We probably put about four or five comic books out a year and probably about two or three art books and various trade paperbacks - maybe four or five of those a year - and that's what we do now.
Glenn Danzig
#53. Anybody can direct a picture once they know the fundamentals. Directing is not a mystery, it's not an art. The main thing about directing is: photograph the people's eyes.
John Ford
#54. I wonder a lot about making things meaningful. You want to do meaningful work and make art, but you're making records, which is good, but you don't want to weight them - it's a very curious thing.
Doseone
#55. If I could talk about it, I would not have to do it. I make art.
Neil Gaiman
#56. We must see that music theory is not only about music, but about how people process it. To understand any art, we must look below its surface into the psychological details of its creation and absorption.
Marvin Minsky
#57. Too much information about nothing.
Bob Dylan
#58. Most true artists care about music as a pure, passionate art form, but can get caught in the trap of the business. Which, sadly, has now become more important than the artist or even the music itself.
Rosanna Arquette
#59. We are cutting things kids like-music, art, and gym classes; stuff that kept me in school. This country can't survive without you kids. It's all about you kids.
Tony Danza
#60. Only art can make the future love you, and that is what art is about: attraction at a distance, seduction from the past, inveiglement from beyond the grave. Art is a plea to love me when I'm gone. And yet, I thought to myself, who could love what I do? Who could possibly love me for this?
Supervert
#61. A lot of young girls don't realise how diverse the career opportunities are in games development. Many think that you need elite math skills and a vast knowledge of all things tech to work in games, and haven't thought about avenues like design, producing, art, writing or composing.
Rhianna Pratchett
#62. Above all else, it is about leaving a mark that I existed: I was here. I was hungry. I was defeated. I was happy. I was sad. I was in love. I was afraid. I was hopeful. I had an idea and I had a good purpose and that's why I made works of art.
Felix Gonzalez-Torres
#63. Told me my tape taught them to swear. What about the make-up you allow your 12 year old daughter to wear?
Eminem
#64. Don't listen to what anyone tells you about the kind of music you make. Just make it! Be yourself, make your own music, and be totally true to your art. Because it's kind of a selfish thing to be an artist.
Billy Sherwood
#65. You've always lived a life of pretense, not a real life
a simulated existence, not a genuine existence. Everything about you, everything you are, has always been pretense, never genuine, never real.
Thomas Bernhard
#66. Did you ever leave a scene and wonder, "What was that all about?
Art Hochberg
#67. We talk about the vulnerability involved in sharing our work publicly. I don't think we talk enough about the real vulnerability involved in making art; if we truly engage the process we are changed by it.
John Paul Caponigro
#68. About Soul Punk:
There was this moment where I worried FOB really wasn't coming back so I tried to make a hit record out of an art project.
Patrick Stump
#69. Female artists are the perfect example of a creator: They know how to make life and art with their bodies. Life comes from their bodies, so on a very basic level, they have more to write about.
Brandon Boyd
#70. I don't ever see movies by myself. I always see them with other people because I want to know what works. I want to know where they laugh. I want to know where they don't laugh. I want to know what they think about it afterwards because in the end that's what the art that I'm working with is.
George Lucas
#71. Every book begins and ends with other people- the readers who suggest the book to us and encourage us to read it, the talented author who crafted each word, the fascinating individuals we meet inside the pages- and the readers we discuss and share the book with when we finish.
Donalyn Miller
#72. If you feel trapped in a situation and are complaining about it, figure out how to untrap yourself and stop complaining. Save your energy for further figuring out and when there is an increase in courage.
Art Hochberg
#73. I didn't want to make 'high' art, I had no interest in using paint, I wanted to find something that anyone could relate to without knowing about contemporary art. I wasn't thinking in terms of precious prints or archival quality; I didn't want the work to seem like a commodity.
Cindy Sherman
#74. On Writing About Nora Hawks
I write about a female character to try, in vain, to understand two things: the purpose of life, and women.
Dennis R. Miller
#75. What is great about art and artists is that we get to ask the questions, even though we may never know the answers.
Dennis Quaid
#76. The usual criticism of a novel about an artist is that, no matter how real he is as a man, he is not real to us as an artist, since we have to take on trust the works of art he produces.
Randall Jarrell
#77. If you focus on what you want and you persevere, chances are you succeed. You know, that's what I found. It might not be in acting - it might be in business, financing, it might be in the arts, it might be in anything. But it's all about focusing and being inspired.
Cory Monteith
#78. My art teacher in junior high was a very out gay man and a mentor to me. He would tell us about Greenwich Village and show us the 'Village Voice' and describe his life, but it was all sort of subversive and below the radar.
Gus Van Sant
#79. Show me what a people admire, and I will tell you everything about them that matters.
Jack McDevitt
#80. There's a lot of thought in art. People get to talk about important things. There's a lot of sex, you know, in art. There's a lot of naked women and men, and there's intrigue, there's fakery. It's a real microcosm of the larger world.
Steve Martin
#81. The art of stunt-making is not about falling down; it's about getting the shot. Creating stunts is creating heroes.
Chad Stahelski
#82. I moved to Chicago and began attending the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. The students and teachers I met in Chicago were politically active and also passionate about the same things that I was interested in. It was a great match for me.
Stephen Beal
#83. 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.
Gerard Way
#84. What's important about the artists we learn about in art history and see in all the art books is that they have somehow pushed the boundaries of what people think art is or should be, and that's how they've made their work relevant. That's what I'm trying to figure out for myself.
Kadir Nelson
#85. Unfortunately, I haven't thought sufficiently about art. What I never realized - and it's really stupid - is the art world is the art world because all these thousands of famous and not-famous artists do things, over centuries. This hadn't occurred to me.
Peter Saul
#86. Boxing is so loose and flowy, and martial arts is more stiff, and about strength and structure.
Taylor Lautner
#87. Community is about sharing my life; about allowing the chaos of another's circumstances to infringe on mine; about permitting myself to be known without constraint; about resigning myself to needing others.
Sandy Oshiro Rosen
#88. The more I see and know about life, the more ideas I have and the more I want to make art.
Kirsten Dunst
#89. One of the things I love about art, is that it can say number of things to people. I broad hope is that it would just open people's hearts and that they would experience love, and that that would experience God.
Michael Gungor
#90. A society that forgets about art risks loslng its soul.
Camille Paglia
#91. Country and western is ignored by the intellectuals. They don't look at it as an art form. They think it's just somebody sitting on his couch singing about his life.
Ricky Skaggs
#92. I'm not talking about YOUR book now, but look at how many books have already been written about the Holocaust. What's the point? People haven't changed ... Maybe they need a newer, bigger Holocaust.
Art Spiegelman
#93. New Orleans jazz is a complex and embracing art form that began about the same time as the blues and encompassed many of its excellences.
Tim Cahill
#94. Art isn't about following the rules. It's about breaking them.
David Sedaris
#95. Many artists who don't go off to art school come to New York. It's about what you learn when you're here.
Urs Fischer
#96. Usually in France we prefer to say bad things about the Nouvelle Vague, but I'm always impressed with its freedom and the fact of not making a film to give your opinion but just as a piece of art, which to me means the Nouvelle Vague.
Arnaud Desplechin
#97. Too much trouble,' 'Too expensive,' or 'Who will know the difference' are death knells for good food ... Cooking is not a particularly difficult art, and the more you cook and learn about cooking, the more sense it makes.
Julia Child
#98. I do think all art is autobiographical, and I do think I know quite a bit about women. I don't know anything about men.
Gloria Vanderbilt
#99. I did an art show for Donald Trump at his house in Palm Beach, Florida. It was a bunch of pop art and stuff like that, so I wasn't doing any graffiti at that time, so I'd say from about 2000 to 2006, I wasn't doing any graffiti.
Alec Monopoly
#100. Hollywood used to be run by artists and people who loved artists ... people who wanted to make movies for all the right reasons. For the love. The Art. To tell stories. Yes to make money as well, but it was about both. Now I feel, it's mostly about bottom line and making money.
Matthew Lillard
