quotes about Abstract
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I wanted to be a painter, somewhere between Abstract Expressionism and Pop.
-- Aaron Huey -
The only way to say what abstract is, is to say what it is not.
-- Ad Reinhardt -
I love the abstract, delicate, profound, vague, voluptuously wordless sensation of living ecstatically.
-- Anais Nin -
Abstract art has helped us to experience the emotional power inherent in pure form.
-- Anton EhrenzweigSource : Anton Ehrenzweig (1967). “The Hidden Order of Art: A Study in the Psychology of Artistic Imagination”, p.147, Univ of California Press
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While those whom devotion to abstract discussions has rendered unobservant of the facts are too ready to dogmatize on the basis of a few observations.
-- Aristotle -
The physical world is entirely abstract and without actuality apart from its linkage to consciousness.
-- Arthur Eddington -
Money is human happiness in the abstract.
-- Arthur Schopenhauer -
It is about this very abstract sense of displacement that he feels the moment he turns off the television.
-- Atom Egoyan -
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Each department of knowledge passes through three stages. The theoretic stage; the theological stage and the metaphysical or abstract stage.
-- Auguste Comte -
Like Aristotle, conservatives generally accept the world as it is; they distrust the politics of abstract reason – that is, reason divorced from experience.
-- Benjamin WikerSource : Benjamin Wiker (2010). “10 Books Every Conservative Must Read: Plus Four Not to Miss and One Impostor”, p.14, Regnery Publishing
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Judaism lives not in an abstract creed, but in its institutions.
-- Berthold Auerbach -
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The process by which civilization, as an abstract entity distinct from the societies in which it is embodied, dies or is reborn is a very significant one.
-- Carroll Quigley -
The abstract has no emotional content... the abstract is more powerful the more abstract it is.
-- Cecil Balmond -
I admire the abstract expressionists and pop artists so right now I'm referencing American '60s art and at the same time referencing Japanese manga culture.
-- Christian Marclay -
Quantum physics is no longer an abstract theory for specialists. We must now absolutely include it in our education and also in our culture.
-- Claude Cohen-TannoudjiSource : "Quantum Physics: From Basic Concepts to Applications". Honeywell-Nobel Laureate Lecture at the Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University, Hyderabad, India, September 15, 2008.
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She was good at playing abstract confusion in the same way that a midget is good at being short.
-- Clive James -
To me, a story can be both concrete and abstract, or a concrete story can hold abstractions. And abstractions are things that really can't be said so well with words.
-- David Lynch -
Screenwriting is always about what people say or do, whereas good writing is about a thought process or an abstract image or an internal monologue, none of which works on screen.
-- David Nicholls -
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I always say that modernization is not an abstract thing; its a very specific task.
-- Dmitry Medvedev -
But nobody is visually naive any longer. We are cluttered with images, and only abstract art can bring us to the threshold of the divine.
-- Dominique de Menil -
Everything abstract is ultimately part of the concrete. Everything inanimate finally serves the living. That is why every activity dealing in abstraction stands in ultimate service to a living whole.
-- Edith Stein -
No cause, no God, no abstract idea can justify the mass slaughter of innocents.
-- Edward SaidSource : Edward W. Said (2007). “From Oslo to Iraq and the Road Map: Essays”, p.117, Vintage
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The more horrifying this world becomes, the more art becomes abstract.
-- Ellen Key -
The longer mathematics lives the more abstract - and therefore, possibly also the more practical - it becomes.
-- Eric Temple BellSource : Eric Temple Bell (1945). “Men of Mathematics”
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The role of the pastor is to embody the gospel. And of course to get it embodied, which you can only do with individuals, not in the abstract.
-- Eugene H. Peterson -
As Buddhist teachers often point out, knowledge, in the sense of prajña, is not knowledge about anything. There is no abstract knower of an experience that is separate from the experience itself.
-- Francisco VarelaSource : Eleanor Rosch, Evan Thompson, Francisco J. Varela (1992). “The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience”, p.26, MIT Press
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Abstract paintings must be as real as those created by the 16th century Italians.
-- Frank Stella -
The complexity of software is an essential property, not an accidental one. Hence, descriptions of a software entity that abstract away its complexity often abstracts away its essence.
-- Fred Brooks -
The mind is inherently embodied. Thought is mostly unconscious. Abstract concepts are largely metaphorical.
-- George LakoffSource : George Lakoff, Mark Johnson (1999). “Philosophy in the Flesh: The Embodied Mind and Its Challenge to Western Thought”, p.3, Basic Books
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Americans have no capacity for abstract thought, and make bad coffee.
-- Georges ClemenceauSource : "The Europeans". Book by Luigi Barzini, p. 225, 1984.
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Nothing is more abstract than reality.
-- Giorgio MorandiSource : Karen Wilkin, Giorgio Morandi (2007). “Giorgio Morandi: works, writings and interviews”, Poligrafa Ediciones Sa
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I am dominated by one thing, an irresistible, burning attraction towards the abstract.
-- Gustave MoreauSource : "Gustave Moreau". Book by Jean Paladilhe and Josbe Pierrep, translated by Bettina Wadia, p. 32, 1972.
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There is plenty of courage among us for the abstract, but not for the concrete.
-- Helen Keller -
Talk with M. Hermite. He never evokes a concrete image, yet you soon perceive that the more abstract entities are to him like living creatures.
-- Henri Poincare -
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Prefer the familiar word to the far-fetched. Prefer the concrete word to the abstract. Prefer the single word to the circumlocution. Prefer the short word to the long. Prefer the Saxon word to the Romance.
-- Henry Watson FowlerSource : Henry Watson Fowler, Francis George Fowler (1931). “The King's English”, Oxford University Press
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Every concrete object has abstract value, is timeless in the dream parallel.
-- Hilda DoolittleSource : Hilda Doolittle, Louis L. Martz (1986). “Collected Poems 1912-1944”, p.523, New Directions Publishing
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Abstract painting is abstract. It confronts you....
-- Jackson PollockSource : Interview, New Yorker, 5 Aug. 1950
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It [abstract art] should be enjoyed just as music is enjoyed after a while you may like it or you may not.
-- Jackson Pollock -
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Film is abstract, not definite. It is a dream.
-- Jacques AudiardSource : Interview With Jason Solomons, www.theguardian.com. December 5, 2009.
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Painting is... a richer language than words... Painting operates through signs which are not abstract and incorporeal like words. The signs of painting are much closer to the objects themselves.
-- Jean Dubuffet -
I feel it's just some sort of game if it's just abstract.
-- Jeffrey Smart -
I wanted to be an abstract painter, but I was rotten at it.
-- Jenny Holzer -
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You're assisting the audience to understand; you're giving them a bridge or an access. And if you don't give them that, if you keep it more abstract, it's almost more pure. It's a cooler thing.
-- Jim Henson -
I guess my experience with some stuff is kind of abstract.
-- Joaquin Phoenix -
Nowadays nobody bothers, and it is considered in slightly bad taste to even raise the question of God's existence. Matters of religion are like matters of sexual preference: they are not discussed in public, and even the abstract questions are discussed only by bores.
-- John Searle -
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A trilogy is a pretty abstract notion. You can apply it to almost any three things.
-- Jonathan DemmeSource : "Neil Young drives a 1956 Crown Vic back in time in Jonathan Demme’s ‘Neil Young: Journeys’" by Chris Kensler, www.foxnews.com. June 18, 2012.
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Abstract painters: redefine your perspectives. Think in terms of the whole, not simply its parts.
-- Joshua L. Goldberg -
I try to make concrete that which is abstract.
-- Juan GrisSource : Response to questionnaire circulated to the Cubists by Amédée Ozenfant and Le Corbusier, editors of "L'Esprit Nouveau" # 5, February 1921.
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Theater is far superior to film in poetry, in abstract poetry.
-- Julie TaymorSource : "Transforming the World through Art". Academy of Achievement Interview, June 3, 2006.
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Do not be deluded by the abstract word Freedom. Whose freedom? Not the freedom of one individual in relation to another, but freedom of Capital to crush the worker.
-- Karl Marx -
I am convinced that abstract form, imagery, color, texture, and material convey meaning equal to or greater than words.
-- Katherine McCoy -
When I conform to truth, I do not conform to an abstract principle; I conform to the nature of God.
-- Kenneth Lee Pike -
In every respect, fantasy is like doing abstract paintings.
-- Lance HenriksenSource : "Lance Henriksen Interview SCREAM OF THE BANSHEE". Interview with Christina Radish, collider.com. March 26, 2011.
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As I say, I as an abstract artist was active politically.
-- Lee Krasner -
Of all the arts, music is really the most abstract.
-- Leo Ornstein -
You cannot be present in an abstract way. Presence is not about disappearing into nothingness. You can only be present with something that is actually here.
-- Leonard Jacobson -
The power to love what is purely abstract is given to few.
-- Margot Asquith -
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My art is not abstract, it lives and breathes
-- Mark Rothko -
All art is abstract, because art is an abstraction of the truth.
-- Milford Zornes -
Music, uniquely among the arts, is both completely abstract and profoundly emotional.
-- Oliver Sacks -
All religions are good 'in principle' - but unfortunately this abstract Good has only rarely prevented their practitioners from behaving like bastards.
-- Paul Feyerabend -
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Hope isn't an abstract theory about where human aspirations end and the impossible begins; it's a never-ending experiment, continually expanding the boundaries of the possible.
-- Paul Rogat Loeb -
In Calvinism and sectarianism man became more and more transformed into an abstract moral subject, as in Descartes he was considered an epistemological subject.
-- Paul Tillich -
I wore one of my Tanguy earrings and one made by Calder in order to show my impartiality between Surrealist and Abstract Art.
-- Peggy Guggenheim -
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Whoever thought the immediate alternates with the immediate action is not an abstract painter.
-- Pierre Alechinsky -
His gaze brushed over her, abstract and hungry. "You burn so very brightly, you know" "Yeah," she muttered. "You said.
-- Rachel Caine -
I don't see Dior as something that could become mine. I see it as a dialogue with the women who wear it. I want to stay connected to them rather than to an abstract brand.
-- Raf Simons -
I have been continuously aware that in painting, I am always dealing with... a relational structure. Which in turn makes permission 'to be abstract' no problem at all.
-- Robert Motherwell -
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Abstract expressionism was the first American art that was filled with anger as well as beauty.
-- Robert Motherwell -
One of the most striking of abstract art's appearances is her nakedness, an art stripped bare.
-- Robert Motherwell -
You have to have the time to feel sorry for yourself in order to be a good abstract expressionist.
-- Robert Rauschenberg -
Oh abstractions are just abstract until they have an ache in them.
-- Stephen DunnSource : Stephen Dunn (1990). “Between Angels”, p.142, W. W. Norton & Company
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Children in the abstract, had never appealed to me. They seemed to be loud creatures, often dripping some form of goo.
-- Stephenie Meyer -
You make knowledge relevant to life and you make it important for children to learn things that will really relate to things going on in their lives, and not abstract.
-- Talib Kweli -
Know what your sin is and confess it; but do not imagine that you have approved yourself a penitent by confessing sin in the abstract.
-- Theodore L. Cuyler -
Our relationship with places is a close bond, intricate in nature, and not abstract, not remote at all: It's enveloping, almost a continuum with all we are and think.
-- Tony Hiss -
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Many attempts have been made by writers on art and poetry to define beauty in the abstract, to express it in the most general terms, to find some universal formula for it.
-- Walter PaterSource : Walter Pater (2013). “The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry”, p.1, Courier Corporation
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The more abstract is form, the more clear and direct its appeal.
-- Wassily KandinskySource : Wassily Kandinsky (1914). “Concerning the Spiritual in Art”, p.32, Courier Corporation
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The force that propels the human spirit on the clear way forward and upward is the abstract spirit.
-- Wassily Kandinsky -
Condemnation by category is the lowest form of hatred, for it is cold-hearted and abstract, lacking even the courage of a personal hatred,
-- Wendell Berry -
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Even an abstract form has to have a likeness.
-- Willem de Kooning -
Even abstract shapes must have a likeness
-- Willem de KooningSource : Willem De Kooning, John Elderfield, Lauren Mahony (2011). “De Kooning: A Retrospective”, p.13, The Museum of Modern Art
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The more chaos there is, the more science holds on to abstract systems of control, and the more chaos is engendered.
-- William Irwin ThompsonSource : William Irwin Thompson (1987). “Gaia, a Way of Knowing: Political Implications of the New Biology”, Inner Traditions International
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I don't like [to] make a woman ... an abstract concept of the fashion. I don't like [to] say, "You must wear that." ... I am not a dictator.
-- Yves Saint Laurent -
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I always just been a fan of the music... and the aesthetic only in an abstract sense.
-- Colin MarstonSource : Source: pitchfork.com
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The common willing of a common world is an eminently practical undertaking and not in the least abstract.
-- Daniel Kemmis -
The inner and outer, the visible and invisible, the abstract and concrete - you've got to get the balance right (not that I do, but it's something to aim for).
-- Elaine EquiSource : Source: www.guernicamag.com
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Everything you do is political, even if it's abstract. You're making a political statement even if it's unwittingly.
-- Eric Drooker -
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Objective painting is not good painting unless it is good in the abstract sense.
-- Georgia O'Keeffe -
The piece of music is nothing without the act of interpretation. That is the only way it can live, and it's a totally abstract thing.
-- Helene GrimaudSource : Interview with Elijah Ho, www.thecounterpoints.com. January 29, 2014.
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I don't know if embarrassed is the right word, about pop, but I prefer the abstract and the distorted in music. And I keep writing these proper melodies and harmonies, and they're the bits that get thrown out of the records! And I have quite a collection.
-- Jason PierceSource : Source: www.interviewmagazine.com
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We know how to work certain toys, and if you've got something in your head you know how to get in on tape, even if it's got an abstract sound to it. We are kind of producers as well as a band, so we're a self-contained unit. We can produce our own record as well as write it.
-- Jez WilliamsSource : Source: pitchfork.com
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We value apology in the abstract, but turn our backs on it in practice.
-- John KadorSource : John Kador (2009). “Effective Apology: Mending Fences, Building Bridges, and Restoring Trust”, p.5, Berrett-Koehler Publishers
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Touring was an abstract idea for me in the beginning. I didn't know where it was going to take me, but I knew that I wanted to go and play for lots of people. I always had that image in my mind. I had no idea what the touring experience was like, and how it was going to unfold, but I knew that I wanted to tour. Then it just started happening slowly started happening.
-- Justin NozukaSource : Source: mousertime.blogspot.com
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I was never really seeking to play music. I knew I wanted to do it, but I think I wasn't seeking it out because it seemed so abstract to me.
-- Kevin MorbySource : Source: www.interviewmagazine.com
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With abstract work, I never was quite sure what it was that felt right about the painting, but I did know that I responded to it and I liked whatever it was offering me.
-- Kurt WagnerSource : Source: pitchfork.com
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