The act of creation is a kind of ritual. The origins of art and human existence lie hidden in this mystery of creation. Human creativity reaffirms and mystifies the power of 'life.
Keith HaringRead
I am intrigued with the shapes people choose as their symbols to create a language. There is within all forms a basic structure, an indication of the entire object with a minimum of lines that becomes a symbol. This is common to all languages, all people, all times.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote emphasizes the universal language of symbols and shapes used in communication across cultures and time.
Keith Haring highlights the intrinsic relationship between shapes and symbols in human communication, suggesting that at their core, all representations share a fundamental structure. This connects to a broader understanding of how art and symbols transcend language barriers, reflecting a shared human experience through visual forms.
Themes
SymbolsLanguageShapesArtCommunication
In practice
Example use cases
A speaker in a workshop about visual communication could use the quote to emphasize the power of symbols.
More from Keith Haring
All quotes →When it is working, you completely go into another place, you're tapping into things that are totally universal, completely beyond your ego and your own self. That's what it's all about.
Keith HaringRead
Drawing is still basically the same as it has been since prehistoric times. It brings together man and the world. It lives through magic.
Keith HaringRead
I don't think art is propaganda; it should be something that liberates the soul, provokes the imagination and encourages people to go further. It celebrates humanity instead of manipulating it.
Keith HaringRead
I think you have to control the materials to an extent, but it's important to let the materials have a kind of power for themselves; like the natural power of gravity, if you are painting on a wall, it makes the paint trickle and it drips; there is no reason to fight that.
Keith HaringRead
My contribution to the world is my ability to draw. I will draw as much as I can for as many people as I can for as long as I can.
Keith HaringRead
Similar quotes
'Untitled' is a time machine that can transport you to 1992, an edgy moment when the art world was crumbling, money was scarce, and artists like Tiravanija were in the nascent stages of combining Happenings, performance art, John Cage, Joseph Beuys, and the do-it-yourself ethos of punk. Meanwhile, a new art world was coming into being.
Jerry SaltzRead
When I listen to music these days, and I hear Pro Tools and drums that sound like a machine - it kinda sucks the life out of music.
Dave GrohlRead
To make music means to express human intelligence by sonic means. This is intelligence in its broadest sense, which includes not only the peregrinations of pure logic but also the "logic" of emotions and intuition. My musical techniques, although often rigorous in their internal structure, leave many openings through which the most complex and mysterious factors of the intelligence may penetrate.
Iannis XenakisRead
Every viewer who ever turned on 'Doctor Who' has taken him into his heart. He belongs to all of us.
Peter CapaldiRead
I never regret things. It's a really dangerous thing to say, but for anyone involved in the arts, the bad things that happen make for good material. It's not a comfortable truth, but it is true.
Antony SherRead
I started out really young, when I was four, five, six, writing poems, before I could play an instrument. I was writing about things when I was eight or 10 years old that I hadn't lived long enough to experience. That's why I also believe in reincarnation, that we were put here with ideas to pass around.
Willie NelsonRead