black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

Form is the shape of content.

Ben Shahn

Of course I realize that photography is not the technical facility as much as it is the eye, and this decision that one makes for the moment at which you are going to snap, you know.
BEN SHAHN

Decision Eye Photography
It may be any one of an infinite number of concepts, none of which may have any possible bearing upon its degree of newness.
BEN SHAHN

Bearing Concept Degree Newness Number Possible
Paint what you are, paint what you believe, paint what you feel.
BEN SHAHN

Believe Feels Paint
I’ve been asked often what is the difference between an amateur and a professional artist, and I will tell you.
BEN SHAHN

Artist Differences Sunday
It is an intimately communicative affair between the painter and his painting, a conversation back and forth, the painting telling the painter even as it receives its shape and form.
BEN SHAHN

Affair Paint Painting Shapes Telling
Now, my knowledge of photography was terribly limited.
BEN SHAHN

Knowledge Limited Photography
Being an artist is not only what you do, but how you live your life.
BEN SHAHN

Artist Being Life Live
Now, when I came on to Washington to begin my job, I was so interested in photography at that time that I really would have preferred to work with Stryker than with my department, which was more artistic if you wish.
BEN SHAHN

Department Jobs Photography Wish Work
We tried to present the ordinary in an extraordinary manner. But that’s the paradox because the only thing extraordinary about it was that it was so ordinary.
BEN SHAHN

Done Ordinary Taken
If you’re going to be an artist, all life is your subject. And all your experience is part of your art.
BEN SHAHN

Art Giving Years
To abstract is to draw out the essence of a matter.
BEN SHAHN

Abstract Essence Matter
Form is the shape of content.
BEN SHAHN

Content Form Shapes
Forms in art arise from the impact of idea upon material… so that thinking and belief and attitudes may endure as actual things.
BEN SHAHN

Art Attitude Thinking
The artist is likely to be looked upon with some uneasiness by the more conservative members of society.
BEN SHAHN

Artist Conservative Member
How do you paint yellow wheat against a yellow sky? You paint it jet black.
BEN SHAHN

Black Sky Yellow
An amateur artist is one who works all week at something else so he can paint on Saturday and Sunday. A professional artist is one whose wife works so he can paint all the time.
BEN SHAHN

Saturday Something Time Wife Work

Form is the shape of content.

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Form is the shape of content.

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