A Quote by Maya Lin

An artist fights to retain the integrity of a work so that it remains a strong, clear vision. Art is and should be the act of an individual willing to say something new, something not quite familiar.

Maya Lin

Quote Topics

Act Art Art Is Artist Clear Clear Vision Familiar Fights Individual Integrity New Quite Remains Retain Say Should Something Something New Strong Vision Willing Work

Quote Author

Maya Lin
American - Architect
Born: October 5, 1959

They say that art should stand the test of time. Life lasts a limited amount of time. Mountains and trees and earth will outlive human beings, but we don't know if they will be here always. Art does outlast the life span of its maker. Art should communicate to an increasing circle of strangers-people who do not know the artist, but come to know the work, and through the work, come to know something about the humanity of the artist that rings with their own humanity.

Anna Deavere Smith

There's a notion of art in this country that you have to be nutty or special or "called" in order to be an artist. I believe the questions everyone should ask themselves are, "Do you want to do it? Are you willing to do it poorly? Are you willing to do the work of doing it? Are you willing to persist when everybody tells you it's silly?" If you're willing to do that, then you can do it.

Kate DiCamillo

Art is difficult. It's not entertainment. There are only a few people who can say something about art - it's very restricted. When I see a new artist I give myself a lot of time to reflect and decide whether it's art or not. Buying art is not understanding art.

Anselm Kiefer

As an aspiring artist, you should strive for originality of vision. Have something to say and a fresh way of saying it. No story is worth the writing, no picture worth the making, if it’s not the work of the imagination.

Maurice Sendak

I'm attracted to the work of younger artists, and it's affordable compared to mature art, so you can take a chance much easier on a younger artist. I can't say that I've found an artist who I think is going to be the next Bacon or Warhol. You shouldn't have to do that really. You go forward, and you find something new.

Laurence Graff

The work of art is always unfaithful to its creator... Art lays at a higher level; it says something more, and almost always, it says something different from what the artist wanted to say.

Octavio Paz

Art is the work of a human, an individual seeking to make a statement, to cause a reaction, to connect. Art is something new, every time, and art might not work, precisely because it's new, because it's human and because it seeks to connect.

Seth Godin

You make sexiness strong by balancing it out: something familiar with something unfamiliar, something masculine with something feminine, something streamlined with something rococo. It's a Yin and Yang. Women are made of layers, your mood shifts, no one is neither one extreme nor the other.

Michael Kors

Art is frightening. Art isn't pretty. Art isn't painting. Art isn't something you hang on the wall. Art is what we do when we're truly alive. An artist is someone who uses bravery, insight, creativity, and boldness to challenge the status quo. And an artist takes it (all of it, the work, the process, the feedback from those we seek to connect with) personally.

Seth Godin

Art is what we call...the thing an artist does. It's not the medium or the oil or the price or whether it hangs on a wall or you eat it. What matters, what makes it art, is that the person who made it overcame the resistance, ignored the voice of doubt and made something worth making. Something risky. Something human. Art is not in the ...eye of the beholder. It's in the soul of the artist.

Seth Godin

If you labor heavily upon a work of art, then part of what you are saying is, 'This is a heavy work of art.' If you happen to be trying to say something about lightness, then the art should be light as well.

Chris Raschka

We are part of each other and part of something bigger than our own egos. An artist should... bring into the world some vision. Dancers should ask, "What is their work in the service of?"

Bill T. Jones

If we want to be a person of integrity, we act as if we have integrity and we will be a person of integrity. If we want to be a person of charity and love, we act as if we have that characteristic and we will be that person. The Savior alluded to this principle when he asked, ‘What manner of men ought ye to be?’ Verily I say unto you, even as I am.' We should strive to become like him by acting as he would act.

Royden G. Derrick

I am convinced that each work of art, be it a great work of genius or something very small, has its own life, and it will come to the artist, the composer or the writer or the painter, and say, "Here I am: compose me; or write me; or paint me"; and the job of the artist is to serve the work.

Madeleine L'Engle

To Jacob the act of critiquing art was essentially imprecise. That's why he didn't read reviews on anything he liked, be it a book, a movie, or a record. He believed that any work an artist puts forth which contains the truth as he or she sees it is worthy of consideration, and any commentary of the work beyond that is nothing more than pure individual opinion and should not be considered relevant to the work itself.