Essential Art Quotes

Art is freedom. If we don't have that element, we don't feel human anymore. Art is not decoration or a function. Before all that, art is art. This connection to meaning - our inner, intuitive knowledge - is something.

Art's a staple. Like bread or wine or a warm coat in winter. Those who think it is a luxury have only a fragment of a mind. Man's spirit grows hungry for art in the same way his stomach growls for food.

Too many people in the modern world view poetry as a luxury, not a necessity like petrol. But to me it's the oil of life.

The word “art” is something the West has never understood. Art is supposed to be a part of a community. Like, scholars are supposed to be a part of a community... Art is to decorate people’s houses, their skin, their clothes, to make them expand their minds, and it’s supposed to be right in the community, where they can have it when they want it... It’s supposed to be as essential as a grocery store... that’s the only way art can function naturally.

A life without music is an error.

Poetry, that is to say the poetic, is a primal necessity.

Art is not a plaything, but a necessity, and its essence, form, is not a decorative adjustment, but a cup into which life can be poured and lifted to the lips and be tasted.

Mozart, Beethoven - how can you not want to share them with everyone and anyone? This stuff is of as great importance as the food we eat and the air we breathe.

If there were no poetry on any day in the world, poetry would be invented that day. For there would be an intolerable hunger.

Music is one of the most essential things in life. It is what teaches us.

Limitations force you to find the essence of what you want to say, which is one of the most important things to know for an artist.

If you take away music from me, I'll die.