Quotes About Artists

I personally have never trusted museums. ... It is because museums, broadly speaking, live off of the art and artifacts of others, often art and artifacts that have been obtained by dubious means. But they also manipulate whatever it is they present to the public; hence, until Judy Chicago, in the 1970s ... few women artists were hung in any major museum. Indian artists? Artifacts only, please. Black artists? Something musical, maybe? And so forth.

The only artists I have ever known who are personally delightful are bad artists. Good artists exist simply in what they make, and consequently are perfectly uninteresting in what they are. A great poet, a really great poet, is the most unpoetical of all creatures. But inferior poets are absolutely fascinating. The worse their rhymes are, the more picturesque they look. The mere fact of having published a book of second-rate sonnets makes a man quite irresistible. He lives the poetry that he cannot write. The others write the poetry that they dare not realize.

I would love to see more dialogue around the "responsibilities" of art consumers - how can audiences better financially support artists we love, artists who are doing the work, so that artists have a more solid foundation upon which to make art?

As long as artists can make something, artists will continue to survive.

With success it's like 60% talent, maybe 20% luck and then 20% being at the right place at the right time. There are so many artists that have been passed by - even though, on paper, they're the most incredibly talented artists, they don't have the social skills to take it outside of the bedroom.

I am of the opinion that there are artists and non-artists. I think that this is the way it always was and always will be. I do not believe that we are in the center of the world. It is possible that there are gods who do not relate to human. As an artist, I believe that it is possible to depict these forces.

Lesser artists borrow, great artists steal.

Artists don't need criticism, artists need love

I get a great laugh from artists who ridicule the critics as parasites and artists manqués — sucha horrible joke. I can’t imagine a more perfect art form, a moreperfect career than criticism. I can’t imagine anything more valuableto do.

I feel like I've been training my entire career for this moment in a lot of ways. So many artists just want to draw Batman, and I'm getting the opportunity to do the backups in a brand-new Scott Snyder project that has so many artists.

Most artists are brought to their vocation when their own nascent gifts are awakened by the work of a master. That is to say, most artists are converted to art by art itself. Finding one's voice isn't just an emptying and purifying oneself of the words of others but an adopting and embracing of filiations, communities, and discourses. Inspiration could be called inhaling the memory of an act never experienced. Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of void but out of chaos. Any artist knows these truths, no matter how deeply he or she submerges that knowing.

Many of us believe that 'real artists' do not experience self-doubt. In truth, artists are people who have learned to live with doubt and do the work anyway.

In the world of comics, Jack Kirby and Will Eisner may have been more influential artists, but Joe Kubert was its most influential man. Even if he were to be remembered solely for his body of illustration work, he’d still be one of the greats, but by opening the Kubert School in 1976, he was able to personally mentor and educate literally thousands of successful artists who owe their careers to his teachings.

The real purveyors of the news are artists, for artists are the ones who infuse fact with perception, emotion, and appreciation...We are beginning to realize that emotions and imagination are more potent in shaping public sentiment and opinion than information and reason.

The feat of superbly imitating a muscle, as Michelangelo did, or a face, as Raphael did, created neither progress nor a hierarchy in art. Because these artists of the sixteenth century imitated human forms, they were not superior to the artists of the high periods of Egyptian, Chaldean, Indochinese, Roman, and Gothic art who interpreted and stylized form but did not imitate it.

All artists are anarchists in some way - some more extreme than others, but it's something that I think artists are supposed to do. We're supposed to present a different angle on everything, and I certainly think it is [art] as much as poetry, in my opinion.

Some artists are told what to like and told definitions of what the music business is. That's a problem. Music is artistry, and you want your music heard, your act known. But artists don't know. They are ignorant the minute they sign a contract.

It’s time for a streaming service that is centred around and driven by the artist community directly. Artists are prolific beyond a new recording every two years. They perform, tour, record, and collaborate constantly. Uprise.fm will not only make these rare and unique recordings available, we will ensure that the artists are fairly compensated for this work.

An artist's voice, communication, that's very important. The learning, the building of your energy to communicate deeper and deeper even without words, the expanse of your source-spark energy to reach people at deeper energy levels is very beautiful to learn about since it's our mission here as artists to help beings transcend limitations and any feeling, thing keeping their love down to show them that we are all artists with very special sides of energy light from the creator.

The very paradigm of revolution, of right versus wrong, good versus bad, is a relic with no bearing on the present. Yet artists, exhibitions, and curators valorize the sixties. People who wrote about these artists 30 years ago still write about them in the same ways, often for the same magazines.

What makes someone an artist? I don't think is has anything to do with a paintbrush. There are painters who follow the numbers, or paint billboards, or work in a small village in China, painting reproductions. These folks, while swell people, aren't artists. On the other hand, Charlie Chaplin was an artist, beyond a doubt. So is Jonathan Ive, who designed the iPod. You can be an artist who works with oil paints or marble, sure. But there are artists who work with numbers, business models, and customer conversations. Art is about intent and communication, not substances.

I think that that's why artists make art - it is difficult to put into words unless you are a poet. What it takes is being open to the flow of universal creativity. The Zen artists knew this.

If some people are right, artists are put into this world not to practice their art, but to talk about it. And judging by the flattering invitations many a humble climber will receive to pontificate from the lowest rung but one of the ladder, humanity is in a dangerously receptive frame of mind, and artists a race devoid of either modesty or sense of humor.

The bad artists imitate, the great artists steal.

It doesn't upset artists to find out that artists used lenses or mirrors or other aids, but it certainly does upset the art historians.

I never really listen to what people say. My thing is that my favorite artists are artists that are theatrical. Obviously when you are doing a recording, things aren't gonna translate as over-the-top.

There's something pleasing about large, well-lit spaces. I love that dealers are willing to take massive chances in order to give this much room to their artists. Most of all, I love that more galleries showing more art gives more artists a shot.

Artists working for other artists is all about knowing, learning, unlearning, initiating long-term artistic dialogues, making connections, creating covens, and getting temporary shelter from the storm.

I think artists are going to express things from an emotional point of view, that's their job, to suggest and interpret, and report what they witness. That's their job as artists, you're looking for the rub, where's the rub, you're a storyteller, you're looking for the rub, not necessarily the solutions, or you're not necessarily educated, you're not the winner of a debate contest, a national debate contest, you're not necessarily a person who has a doctorate in anything.

If you view computer designers as artists, they're really into more of an art form that can be mass-produced, like records, or like prints, than they are into fine arts. They want something where they can express themselves to a large number of people through their medium, and their medium is technology and manufacturing.

Artists speak the truth to the public without fear of retribution or damage to their careers.

We think it hugely important to support young artists, there is a war against that kind of artistry, that kind of creation...When somebody is 19 years old, they're gonna do what they're gonna do just like we did... For me the most important thing was for him to know anytime he can call and I'll come whatever happens.

I don't believe artists should be subjected to experiences that harden the sensibilities; without sensibility no fine work can ever be done.

I used to teach on a college level, and I've taught in schools where kids just wanted to be artists, and I used to be furious with them if they didn't read, because they just seemed so - their education seemed so thin if all they could do was pick up a paint-loaded brush and fling it at a canvas. I mean, there was nothing to express there, except maybe their own personal feelings. But if they're not - if they don't have a grounding in the way these things have been expressed by other people down through the centuries, then they're lost.

Im interested in the liberating aspect of being totally untethered, let loose in the worst possible environments. My favorite artists are always women that do things that are so wrong... I like things to be seven kinds of wrong. If they are seven kinds of wrong, sometimes the wrongs neutralize themselves, and the whole thing becomes.

I think there can be a misrepresentation of who I am a lot of times because I might be more quiet than other artists. I don't walk in the room going, "Here I am!" I'm going to be the guy standing in the corner taking everything in. I think that can be taken the wrong way, as if I'm not interested in what's going on around, but it's not really the case.

When artists give form to revelation, their art can advance, deepen and potentially transform the consciousness of their community.

I'm one of the artists that even though I love my soulful stuff, I love to turn up and have a good time and that's another side of me. As long as it doesn't veer away from who I am, I'm down with it.

I want people to know about these visionary artists. I want people to know what they stand for and (that) they are representing something unique, something fresh. I am just so excited about their careers.

People like Howlin' Wolf, Bob Dylan, The Rolling Stones, John Lee Hooker, Nina Simone, Captain Beefheart - all of these artists were what I grew up listening to every day of my life. And there's a very healthy music scene in the west country of England, where I grew up.

It seems that our politicians see the world in black and white, so why not our artists? Did Woody Allen's 'Manhattan' have to be in black and white? No. But is it fantastic that it was? To see New York like that? Yes!

I think that some of the writing, directing, and the content is better than a lot of movies sometimes. Actors, well artists in general - actors, writers, directors - what we all care about the most is good work and being able to create something that is really resonant and meaningful.

If sometimes our great artists have been the most critical of our society, it is because their sensitivity and their concern for justice, which must motivate any true artist, makes him aware that our nation falls short of its highest potential. I see little of more importance to the future of our country and our civilization than full recognition of the place of the artist.

In this world, artists are joyous. Unpredictability is the life of their paintings, their music, their novels. They delight in events not forecasted, happenings without explanation, retrospective.

I think that the first responsibility of an artist is to follow truth, and the innate original forces and energies that are within them. At the same time, I also think, collectively, that there has to be a place for artists to reflect and deal with the society they're living in. I think that great art inevitably reflects some of the drama and trauma and conflicts that exist in the outer world.

I think it would be very good if writers and artists take a stand in electoral politics. They've got the ability to put words together that might reach the ears of the people of the city who vote.

Country artists have advantages all over the place. The radio support is incredible. The fanbase is rabid, all over.

I think that we have a unique opportunity as performers and artists to be kind of the town criers and also to get more people to listen, so that's a blessing and a responsibility that I take very seriously.