All art is based on nonconformity … Without nonconformity we would have had no Bill of Rights or Magna Carta, no public education system, no nation upon this continent, no continent, no science at all, no philosophy, and considerably fewer religions.
BEN SHAHNTo abstract is to draw out the essence of a matter.
More Ben Shahn Quotes
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Only an individual can imagine, invent, or create. The whole audience of art is an audience of individuals.
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I believe that if it were left to artists to choose their own labels, most would choose none.
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To abstract is to draw out the essence of a matter.
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I’ve been asked often what is the difference between an amateur and a professional artist, and I will tell you.
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Personal style, be it that of Michelangelo, or that of Tintoretto… has always been that peculiar personal rapport which has developed between an artist and his medium.
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The artist is likely to be looked upon with some uneasiness by the more conservative members of society.
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All art is based on non-conformity.
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The apprehension of… values is intuitive; but it is not a built-in intuition, not something with which one is born. Intuition in art is actually the result of… prolonged tuition.
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I was brought in, not in the photographic department at all, I was brought in on a thing called Special Skills. I was to do posters, pamphlets, murals, propaganda in general, you know.
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The popular eye is not untrained; it is only wrongly trained – trained by inferior and insincere visual representations.
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A youngster told me recently that he was going to give himself a year to see if he has talent. A year! It takes a lifetime to see if you have it. Painting is total engagement.
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If you’re going to be an artist, all life is your subject. And all your experience is part of your art.
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I feel, having the choices I had, I felt I had more control over my own medium than I did over photography.
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Nobody had ever done it before, deliberately. Now it’s called documentary, which I suppose is all right … We just took pictures that cried out to be taken.
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Form is the shape of content.
BEN SHAHN