They say that a picture is worth a thousand words. So what is the worth of those words used to describe such a picture? Two thousand words?
We will let you decide the overall worth of the statements below, but one thing is for certain – the speakers sure were in awe for the power of art.
Anaïs Nin, The Diary of Anaïs Nin
“I am an excitable person who only understands life lyrically, musically, in whom feelings are much stronger as reason. I am so thirsty for the marvelous that only the marvelous has power over me. Anything I can not transform into something marvelous, I let go. Reality doesn’t impress me. I only believe in intoxication, in ecstasy, and when ordinary life shackles me, I escape, one way or another. No more walls.”
Thomas Merton, No Man is an Island
“Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.”
W. Somerset Maugham, The Moon and Sixpence
“I felt that these pictures had something to say to me that was very important for me to know, but I could not tell what it was…. They gave me an emotion that I could not analyse. They said something that words were powerless to utter.”
Harvey Fierstein, “Reimagining the Story of Newsies“
“Art has the power to transform, to illuminate, to educate, inspire and motivate.”
Nina Baldwin, “Artscapes: Art is Power”
“Art is power. It can influence perception, opinion and values. And the artist who creates uses his paintbrush to focus on a moment in time…recording those things that touch the heart.”
Ossie Davis, in Jeanne Noble’s Beautiful, Also, Are the Souls of My Black Sisters
“Any form of art is a form of power; it has impact, it can affect change – it can not only move us, it makes us move.”
Pablo Picasso, quoted in Life
“Art washes from the soul the dust of everyday life.”
Leo Tolstoy, What Is Art?
“[Art] is a means of union among men, joining them together in the same feelings, and indispensable for the life and progress toward well-being of individuals and of humanity.”
Oscar Wilde, “The Soul of Man under Socialism”
“Art is the most intense mode of individualism that the world has known.”
Gary Holland, quoted in “The Art of Healing”
“I endeavor to trigger positive, empowering, life-giving emotion – I believe art is that powerful.”
Maria Popova, “What Is Art? Favorite Famous Definitions, from Antiquity to Today”
“This is the power of art: The power to transcend our own self-interest, our solipsistic zoom-lens on life, and relate to the world and each other with more integrity, more curiosity, more wholeheartedness.”
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About Paperblanks®: At Paperblanks®, we believe that art should have a place in all aspects of life. That’s why we follow the artist’s way in everything we do – creating, crafting and releasing designs we believe have the power to touch people. For more about Paperblanks®, go to our website at paperblanks.com.
