Wise Words

Thoughts on Art from creative people born February 14:

from Italian Renaissance humanist author, architect, artist, and poet Leon Battista Alberti (Palazzo Rucellai, Santa Maria Novello, Piazza Pio II at Pienza, De pictura, De re aedificatoria) (1404-1472):

The Arts are learnt by reason and method; they are mastered by practice.

I would have artists be convinced that the supreme skill and art in painting consists in knowing how to use black and white... because it is light and shade that make objects appear in relief.

No art, however minor, demands less than total dedication if you want to excel in it.

There is no art which has not had its beginnings in things full of errors. Nothing is at the same time both new and perfect.

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from American abolitionist Frederick Douglass (Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by Himself, My Bondage and My Freedom, Life and Times of Frederick Douglass) (1818-1890):

Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.

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from Irish-born American journalist Frank Harris (Saturday Review, Pearson's Magazine, My Life and Loves) (1856-1931):

I am, really, a great writer; my only difficulty is in finding great readers.

Memoirs are a well-known form of fiction.

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from British novelist, playwright, and Zionist leader Israel Zangwill (Children of the Ghetto, The Big Bow Mystery, The Melting Pot, Merely Mary Ann) (1864-1926):

There never was an age in which so many people were able to write badly.

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from American author, editor, and drama critic George Jean Nathan (The Smart Set, The American Mercury, The American Spectator, Theatre Book of the Year) (1882-1958):

Criticism is the art of appraising others at one's own value.

An actor without a playwright is like a hole without a doughnut.

To speak of morals in art is to speak of legislature in sex. Art is the sex of the imagination.

A poet, any real poet, is simply an alchemist who transmutes his cynicism regarding human beings into an optimism regarding the moon, the stars, the heavens, and the flowers, to say nothing of the spring, love, and dogs.

Criticism is the art wherewith a critic tries to guess himself into a share of the artist’s fame.

Great art is as irrational as great music. It is mad with its own loveliness.

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from Welsh-English painter and author Nina Hamnett (Der Sturm, The Landlady, The People's Album of London Statues, The Laughing Torso) (1890-1956):

On February the fourteenth, 1890, I was born. Everybody was furious, especially my Father, who still is. As soon as I became conscious of anything I was furious too...

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from German author, philosopher, academic, and film director Alexander Kluge (Abschied von Gestern, Der Angriff der Gegenwart auf die übrige Zeit, Öffentlichkeit und Erfahrung, "Geschichte und Eigensinn") (b. 1932):

Phantasy provides a kind of temporary glue, which keeps people from falling apart through the production of illusions which enable them somehow to live with themselves.

Human beings are not interested in reality. They can’t be; it’s the human essence. They have wishes. These wishes are strictly opposed to any ugly form of reality. They prefer to lie than to become divorced from their wishes...[they] forget everything and can give up everything except this principle of misunderstanding reality, the subjective... If this is real, then the media industry is realistic in telling fiction, and the construction of reality founded on this basis can only lie. This is one of the reasons why history isn’t realistic: it’s not documentary, it’s not genuine, and it’s not necessary.

Writing literary texts, you look—if you're going about it correctly—down to yourself, to your head from above. Then you no longer have a relationship with yourself. At the most, you have trust in yourself that a text will emerge from this and that you still have the sovereignty and the strength to throw it away if it amounts to nothing.

Hidden in a long text, there are perhaps three lines that count.

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from Canadian playwright Norm Foster (The Melville Boys, The Affections of May, Maggie's Getting Married) (b. 1949):

Acting is great fun, but writing is my first love. A lot of people out there like the “idea” of being a writer. The romance of it. The notion that we all sit around in cafes and talk about our writing with other writers. Personally, I would rather do it than talk about it. The actual process of writing is what excites me. Creating a world from the ground up and populating it with characters I've pulled out of my head.

One of the curses of being a playwright is that you're never ever completely satisfied with your finished product.

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from American television writer and producer Moira Kirland (Dark Angel, Medium, Castle, The InBetween) (b. 1978):

Never love your day job. I did love my day job and stayed there for ten years. I think if I had been less happy there, I might have come to the realization that there were other things I wanted to do sooner. Not loving your day job if you want to be a writer keeps you motivated. You’re just paying the rent. That’s really what you’re doing.

So I try to remind myself and others in this, you gotta have that belief in yourself. You’ve got to believe you’ll get another job. You gotta believe you can do the job that you’ve just taken.

You should always be writing. You should have nothing but samples stacked up, because everybody is going to want something different.

I once said something to my mother that she quotes back to me all the time. I was taking a risk and I’m not really a risk taker. She said, “Are you sure that’s what you want to do?” I told her, “I have to bet on myself. I never lose when I bet on myself. Because win or lose, I’m better for it.”