There is a cliché that the artist is the person who best re… - Ben Shahn

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There is a cliché that the artist is the person who best reflects his time. I am not ready to accept that definition of the artist, nor the idea that the art is best which best reflects its time. The function of the artist is a little more than to reflect; he has to refract, to set things off in another direction.

Ben Shahn

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About Ben Shahn

Ben Shahn (September 12, 1898 – March 14, 1969) was an American artist. He is best known for his works of social realism, his left-wing political views, and his series of lectures published as The Shape of Content.

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Originators like Ben Shahn:

Harold Rosenberg Patrick Swift Andrei Tarkovsky Henri Matisse Paul Klee

Additional quotes by Ben Shahn

What is it about us, the public, and what is it about conformity itself that causes us all to require it of our neighbors and of our artists and then, with consummate fickleness, to forget those who fall into line and eternally celebrate those who do not?

I think that one of the great virtues of the university lies in its being a community in the fullest sense of the word, a place of residence, and at the same time one of personal affirmation and intellectual rapport.

Conformity is a mood and an atmosphere, a failure of hope or belief or rebellion.

There is a cliché that the artist is the person who best reflects his time. I am not ready to accept that definition of the artist, nor the idea that… - Ben Shahn

About Ben Shahn

Additional quotes by Ben Shahn