Traditionally art is to create and not to revive. To revive: leave that to the historians, who are looking backward.
Interpretation
Art should focus on creation rather than attempting to recreate or revive past works.
In this quote, Josef Albers emphasizes the importance of originality in art. He suggests that true artistic expression lies in the act of creation, while historians play a vital role in preserving and reflecting on the past. By urging artists to look forward rather than backward, Albers champions innovation and the continual evolution of artistic expression.
In practice
During a lecture on modern art, you can use this quote to highlight the importance of artistic creativity.
Simultaneous contrast is not just a curious optical phenomenon β it is the very heart of painting. Repeated experiments with adjacent colors will show that any ground subtracts its own hue from the colors which it carries and therefore influences.
Instead of art I have taught philosophy. Though technique for me is a big word, I never have taught how to paint. All my doing was to make people to see.
When we are honest - that's my saying - if we are honest then we will reveal ourselves. But we do not have to make an effort to be individualistic, different from others.
Ah, the creative process is the same secret in science as it is in art. They are all the same absolutely.
In order to use color effectively it is necessary to recognize that color deceives continually.
The aim of our studies is to prove that color is the most relative means of artistic expression, that we never really perceive what color is physically.
I want to sound like an instrument. I want my voice and my words to marry the beat. I go with the rhythm of it and the words start to come to my mind and those words could be based on things that's been on my mind for the past year, the past month, the past week, whatever; I write it.
I paint the way someone bites his fingernails; for me, painting is a bad habit because I don't know nor can I do anything else.
The trap into which all writers have, will, or should fall into, of writing The Great American Watchamacallit, is such an uncluttered and inviting one that from time to time I'm sure even the greatest have to pull themselves up short by the Shift key to remind themselves that it is story first that they should write.
Presence is far more intricate and rewarding an art than productivity.
The more I think about it, the more I realize there is nothing more artistic than to love others.
The reason dance has held such an ageless magic for the world is that it has been the symbol of the performance of living.
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