A Quote by Thomas Hoving

The definition of art has changed almost every day since the first artist created the first work at least fifty thousand years ago. — © Thomas Hoving
The definition of art has changed almost every day since the first artist created the first work at least fifty thousand years ago.
Oh, give me back the good old days of fifty years ago,“ has been the cry ever since Adam's fifty-first birthday.
A day without a dark cloud. Almost a happy day. There were three thousand six hundred and fifty-three days like that in his stretch. From the first clang of the rail to the last clang of the rail. Three thousand six hundred and fifty-three days. The three extra days were for leap years.
We have come to think of art and work as incompatible, or at least independent categories and have for the first time in history created an industry without art.
One can re-create what was in the mind of a mathematician a thousand years ago, recapture the truth of the intellect wherever it may have once come to light; but the image of art, that infinite variable of perception and expression in the individual, - that is not easily re-created, at least, not with certainty and in its original fulness.
Stop thinking about writing as art. Think of it as work. If you’re an artist, whatever you do is going to be art. If you’re not an artist, at least you can do a good day’s work.
It's odd. Though I've spent years working with and creating images, I feel most comfortable expressing myself through writing. I'd been in denial about this for many years. At school I was highly lauded as having the potential to write one day, but being a typically rebellious and misguided teenager I opted to study art. Ironically language has pervaded all the work I have done - from my first forays into an art practice many years ago to my work with typography and book design.
Al Gore has been one of my closest friends since the day we met, on the first day of college, 35 years ago.
But after the spirit of conquest had changed the first governments, all the succeeding ones have, in general, proved one continued series of injustice, which has reigned in all countries for almost four thousand years.
It depends on what your dream might be, as to whether or not it's still possible when you're, say, fifty or sixty. You won't ever pitch for the big leagues, for example. But I believe anyone, regardless of age, can write if he or she is willing to do the work, and I'm talking about spending at least an hour or two at it almost every day for five to ten years.
I started off doing indie comics that I wrote and drew myself. I was doing those for ten years before I started to work for DC. The first book that I wrote for DC was for another artist. I did some backups in 'Adventure Comics' years ago starring The Atom. That's the first time that I ever wrote for another artist.
It is obvious that art cannot teach anyone anything, since in four thousand years humanity has learnt nothing at all. We should long ago have become angels had we been capable of paying attention to the experience of art, and allowing ourselves to be changed in accordance with the ideals it expresses. Art only has the capacity, through shock and catharsis, to make the human soul receptive to good. It’s ridiculous to imagine that people can be taught to be good…Art can only give food – a jolt – the occasion – for psychical experience.
I believe very strongly, and have fought since many years ago - at least over 30 years ago - to get architecture not just within schools, but architecture talked about under history, geography, science, technology, art.
Resolve to make at least one person happy every day, and then in ten years you may have made three thousand, six hundred and fifty persons happy, or brightened a small town by your contribution to the fund of general enjoyment.
The ordinary American - as far as I can tell - knows so much less than he did fifty years ago and has such poor work habits compared with fifty years ago that the average multiplicand of knowledge/capabilities is a much smaller number than it was in 1961.
It was my fear of failure that first kept me from attempting the master work. Now, I'm beginning what I could have started ten years ago. But I'm happy at least that I didn't wait twenty years.
Women are afraid. It is unpopular to question the bible. They are creatures of tradition. They fear to question their position in the testament, as they feared to advocate suffrage fifty years ago. Now they are quarreling as to which were among the first to advocate it. You see they are not used to abuse as I am. In Albany, fifty years ago, when I went before the legislature to plead for a married woman's right to her own property, the women whom I met in society crossed the street rather than speak to me.
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