An apology offered and, equally important, received is a step towards reconciliation and, sometimes, recompense. Without that process, hurts can rankle and fester and erupt into their own hatreds and wrongdoings.
Margaret MacmillanRead
Are artists the canaries in the mine, warning of the coming explosion before anyone else? It's hard to look at the world before 1914 and not wonder if they somehow felt a catastrophe was bearing down on them and their societies.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Artists may sense and express societal issues before they become apparent to the general public.
This quote by Margaret Macmillan suggests that artists possess a unique sensitivity to the underlying tensions and potential crises within society. Just as canaries were once used in coal mines to detect dangerous gases, artists often reflect and comment on the prevailing cultural and social dynamics, potentially foreseeing significant events and changes before they manifest in the wider world.
Themes
ArtistsSocietyForewarningCatastropheCreativity
In practice
Example use cases
During a speech about cultural awareness, one could use this quote to emphasize the role of artists in society.
More from Margaret Macmillan
All quotes →Climate change respects no borders.
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War is a crucial, deeply ingrained part of human history. It has to be understood.
Margaret MacmillanRead
There was that argument that if we had more women in positions of authority, the world would be a nicer place. And then we got Golda Meir, Margaret Thatcher, Sirimavo Bandaranaike, Indira Gandhi. When women become acclimatised to war, they can become every bit as ruthless as men.
Margaret MacmillanRead
Theodore Roosevelt's policy to build a two-ocean navy confirmed that the old-style isolationism of the founders had not survived the modern, increasingly globalized world.
Margaret MacmillanRead
If we don't take responsibility for each other, it seems to me the future is going to be even bleaker.
Margaret MacmillanRead
Similar quotes
Painting is just another way of keeping a diary.
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That sculpture is more admirable than painting for the reason that it contains relief and painting does not is completely false. ... Rather, how much more admirable the painting must be considered, if having no relief at all, it appears to have as much as sculpture!
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Art is the most beautiful of all lies.
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People like Dick Gregory, Paul Robeson, Harry Belafonte and Nina Simone show me what the definition of an artist is - it isn't just to make art but to speak truth to what's happening, speak beauty into the world, speak love into the world and also... get involved.
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Painting what I experience, translating what I feel, is like a great liberation. But it is also work, self-examination, consciousness, criticism, struggle.
BalthusRead
I see things with my own eyes, just as if they were the first eyes that ever saw, and then I set about to tell, as best I can, just what I've seen.
Edna St. Vincent MillayRead