We look at a painting to know the painter; it's his company we are after, not his skill.
James WhistlerRead
Art happens-no hovel is safe from it, no prince may depend upon it, the vastest intelligence cannot bring it about.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Art is an omnipresent force that cannot be controlled or dictated by status or intelligence.
In this quote, James Whistler expresses the idea that art transcends social status and intellect. It is a universal and spontaneous phenomenon that can emerge from anywhere, regardless of the environment or the individuals involved. This emphasizes the democratizing nature of art, suggesting that it cannot be confined to elite spaces or dictated by pretentious standards; it flourishes independent of human control.
Themes
ArtCreativityExpressionFreedomUniversal
In practice
Example use cases
Using this quote in an art exhibition to emphasize the inclusivity of art.
More from James Whistler
All quotes βTo say of a picture, as is often said in its praise, that it shows great and earnest labour, is to say that it is incomplete and unfit for view.
James WhistlerRead
I maintain that two and two would continue to make four, in spite of the whine of the amateur for three, or the cry of the critic for five.
James WhistlerRead
To say to the painter that Nature is to be taken as she is, is to say to the player that he may sit on the piano.
James WhistlerRead
An artist is not paid for his labor but for his vision.
James WhistlerRead
Similar quotes
There is the music of Heaven in all things.
Hildegard Of BingenRead
Iconic clothing has been secularized. . . . A guardsman in a dress uniform is ostensibly an icon of aggression; his coat is red as the blood he hopes to shed. Seen on a coat-hanger, with no man inside it, the uniform loses all its blustering significance and, to the innocent eye seduced by decorative colour and tactile braid, it is as abstract in symbolic information as a parasol to an Eskimo. It becomes simply magnificent.
Angela CarterRead
Scorn not the sonnet. Critic, you have frowned, Mindless of its just honours; with this key Shakespeare unlocked his heart.
William WordsworthRead
When I was in Cambridge reading mathematics, I went to Amsterdam for the International Mathematics Congress. There I saw M.C. Escher's fascinating work. That inspired me to try my hand at drawing such impossibilities.
Roger PenroseRead
I want a storm to come and flood us into a song that no one wrote.
Frida KahloRead
Everybody thinks they know what art should be. But very few of them have the sense that is necessary to experience painting, that is the sense of sight, that sees colors and forms as living reality in the picture.
Otto DixRead