A work of art doesn't have to be explained. If you do not have any feeling about this, I cannot explain it to you. If this doesn't touch you, I have failed.
Louise BourgeoisRead
Space is something that you have to define. Otherwise, it is like anxiety, which is too vague. A fear is something specific. I like claustrophobic spaces, because at least then you know your limits.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Space must be defined to avoid ambiguity, much like how specific fears are clearer than vague anxieties.
In this quote, Louise Bourgeois emphasizes the importance of defining the concept of 'space' to provide clarity and understanding. Just as anxiety can feel overwhelming due to its vagueness, the idea of space becomes more manageable when we set boundaries or limits, akin to how specific fears can be more easily confronted. By referencing her preference for claustrophobic spaces, she suggests that knowing one's limits can offer a sense of control and safety amidst the complexities of emotion and environment.
Themes
SpaceAnxietyFearLimitsClaustrophobic
In practice
Example use cases
During a workshop on mental health, one might use this quote to illustrate the importance of defining feelings to gain clarity.
More from Louise Bourgeois
All quotes →Clothing is . . . an exercise in memory. It makes me explore the past: how did I feel when I wore that. They are like signposts in the search for the past.
Louise BourgeoisRead
It is not so much where my motivation comes from but rather how it manages to survive.
Louise BourgeoisRead
I always had the fear of being separated and abandoned. The sewing is my attempt to keep things together and make things whole.
Louise BourgeoisRead
It is not a torment to be an artist. It is a privilege.
Louise BourgeoisRead
Art is a guarantee of sanity. That is the most important thing I have_x000D_ said.
Louise BourgeoisRead
Similar quotes
Study is to study what cannot be studied. Undertaking means undertaking what cannot be undertaken. Philosophizing is to philosophize about what cannot be philosophized about. Knowing that knowing is unknowable is true perfection.
ZhuangziRead
Live in the world as if only God and your soul were in it; then your heart will never be made captive by any earthly thing.
John Of The CrossRead
The speech we hear is an indication of that which we don't hear. It is a necessary avoidance, a violent, sly, and anguished or mocking smoke screen which keeps the other in its true place. When true silence falls we are left with echo but are nearer nakedness. One way of looking at speech is to say that it is a constant stratagem to cover nakedness.
Harold PinterRead
Behold I do not give lectures or a little charity, When I give I give myself.
Walt WhitmanRead
Retirement may be looked upon either as a prolonged holiday or as a rejection, a being thrown on to the scrap-heap.
Simone De BeauvoirRead
When you come to look into this argument from design, it is a most astonishing thing that people can believe that this world, with all the things that are in it, with all its defects, should be the best that omnipotence and omniscience has been able to produce in millions of years.
Bertrand RussellRead