Art Quotes by Roland Barthes

9 Art quotes by Roland Barthes

Roland Barthes’ nine observations on art distill his critical eye into a compact set, inviting readers to consider the layers of meaning behind each image.

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For the theatre one needs long arms; it is better to have them too long than too short. An artiste with short…

Roland Barthes

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The art of living has no history: it does not evolve: the pleasure which vanishes vanishes for good, there is no substitute…

Roland Barthes

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The realists do not take the photograph for a 'copy' of reality, but for an emanation of past reality, a magic, not…

Roland Barthes

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Usually the amateur is defined as an immature state of the artist: someone who cannot — or will not — achieve the…

Roland Barthes

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I think that cars today are almost the exact equivalent of the great Gothic cathedrals: I mean the supreme creation of an…

Roland Barthes

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“We often hear it said that it is the task of art to express the inexpressible: it is contrary which must be…

Roland Barthes

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“What is the use of composing if it is to confine the product within the precinct of the concert or the solitude…

Roland Barthes

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“So long as I perceive the world as hostile, I remain linked to it: *I am not crazy*. But sometimes, once my…

Roland Barthes

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“Hence the detail which interests me is not, or at least is not strictly intentional, and probably must not be so; it…

Roland Barthes

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More by Roland Barthes

“Werther identifies himself with the madman, with the footman. As a reader, I can identify myself with Werther. Historically, thousands of subjects have done…

Roland Barthes

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The Text is not a definitive object.

Roland Barthes

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“Valéry used to speak of those people who die in an accident because they are unwilling to let go of their umbrellas; how many…

Roland Barthes

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Today there is no symbolic compensation for old age, no recognition of a specific value: wisdom, perceptiveness, experience, vision.

Roland Barthes

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The unary Photograph has every reason to be banal, 'unity' of composition being the first rule of vulgar (and notably, of academic) rhetoric: 'The…

Roland Barthes

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“A creative writer is one for whom writing is a problem.”

Roland Barthes

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“Man does not exist prior to language, either as a species or as an individual. We never encounter a state where man is separated…

Roland Barthes

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“It is said that Time soothes mourning – No, Time makes nothing happen; it merely makes the emotivity of mourning pass.”

Roland Barthes

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“So long as I perceive the world as hostile, I remain linked to it: *I am not crazy*. But sometimes, once my bad temper…

Roland Barthes

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I think that cars today are almost the exact equivalent of the great Gothic cathedrals: I mean the supreme creation of an era, conceived…

Roland Barthes

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“(Sartre) (The world is full without me, as in Nausea; the world plays at living behind a glass partition; the world is in an…

Roland Barthes

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“Like love, mourning affects the world—and the worldly—with unreality, with importunity. I resist the world, I suffer from what it demands of me, from…

Roland Barthes