George Wein

The arts are not just a nice thing to have or to do if there is free time or if one can afford it. Rather, paintings and poetry, music and fashion, design and dialogue, they all define who we are as a people and provide an account of our history for the next generation.

She opened up a book of poems and handed it to me written by an Italian poet from the 13th century and every one of them words rang true and glowed like burning coal pouring off of every page like it was written in my soul from me to you.

Without art, the crudeness of reality would make the world unbearable.

Go a little bit out of your depth. And when you don’t feel that your feet are quite touching the bottom, you’re just about in the right place to do something exciting.

The conventional notions of art have changed, and a lot of things done today are considered works of art that would have been rejected in the past.

Can anybody be given creativity? No. Only equipment to develop it if it’s in them in the first place.

I’m just an individual who doesn’t feel that I need to have somebody qualify my work in any particular way. I’m working for me.

Art is the only way to run away without leaving home.

There is only 1 difference between a madman and me. I am not mad.

What’s any artist, but the dregs of his work? the human shambles that follows it around. What’s left of the man when the work’s done but a shambles of apology.

People with talent are not interested in showing off behind another person.

There is nothing new… everything has roots in the past.

I cry out for order and find it only in art.

All art inspires me. Life inspires me. The art of life, thus my own art.

The role of a museum of modern art is to make a good selection and identify what we believe to be the coming movements, and that requires taste.