Art almost always has its ingredient of impudence, its flouting of established authority, so that it may substitute its own authority and its own enlightenment.
BEN SHAHNIt is not the how of painting but the why. To imitate a style would be a little like teaching a tone of voice or a personality.
More Ben Shahn Quotes
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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.
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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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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.
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The values that reside in art are anarchic, they are every man’s loves and hates and his momentary divine revelation.
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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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The moving toward one’s inner self is a long pilgrimage for a painter. It offers many temporary successes and high points, but impels him on toward the more adequate image.
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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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The popular eye is not untrained; it is only wrongly trained – trained by inferior and insincere visual representations.
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Forms in art arise from the impact of idea upon material… so that thinking and belief and attitudes may endure as actual things.
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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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Content may by trivial. But I do not think that any person may pronounce either upon the weight or upon the triviality of an idea before its execution.
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The natural reaction of the artist will be strongly towards bringing man back into focus as the center of importance.
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Form is the shape of content.
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It may be a point of great pride to have a Van Gogh on the living room wall, but the prospects of having Van Gogh himself in the living room would put a great many devoted art lovers to rout.
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When you talk about war on poverty it doesn’t mean very much; but if you can show to some degree this sort of thing then you can show a great deal more of how people are living and a very great percentage of our people today.
BEN SHAHN