Herbert Read

Art is an indecent exposure of the consciousness.

— Herbert Read

Art is pattern informed by sensibility.

— Herbert Read

The modern work of art, as I have said, is a symbol.

— Herbert Read

The slave may be happy, but happiness is not enough.

— Herbert Read

I know of no better name than Anarchism.

— Herbert Read

The sensitive artist knows that a bitter wind is blowing.

— Herbert Read

Love works miracles in stillness.

— Herbert Read

Man is everywhere still in chains.

— Herbert Read

“Al popularizarse la cultura, al ser "mediada" a las masas, queda necesariamente diluida, castrada, deformada.”

— Herbert Read

If modern art has produced symbols that are unfamiliar, that was only to be expected.

— Herbert Read

The characteristic political attitude of today is not one of positive belief, but of despair.

— Herbert Read

If the individual is a unit in a corporate mass, his life is not merely brutish and short, but dull and mechanical.

— Herbert Read

Creeds and castes, and all forms of intellectual and emotional grouping, belong to the past.

— Herbert Read

The sense of historical continuity, and a feeling for philosophical rectitude cannot, however, be compromised.

— Herbert Read

In general, modern art... has been inspired by a natural desire to chart the uncharted.

— Herbert Read

In the evolution of mankind there has always been a certain degree of social coherence.

— Herbert Read

It will be a gay world. There will be lights everywhere except in the minds of men, and the fall of the…

— Herbert Read

The most general law in nature is equity-the principle of balance and symmetry which guides the growth of forms along the lines…

— Herbert Read

The point I am making is that in the more primitive forms of society the individual is merely a unit; in more…

— Herbert Read

There are a few people, but a diminishing number, who still believe that Marxism, as an economic system, off era a coherent…

— Herbert Read

Freud has shown one thing very clearly: that we only forget our infancy by burying it in the unconscious; and that the…

— Herbert Read

To realize that new world we must prefer the values of freedom and equality above all other values - above personal wealth,…

— Herbert Read

It does not seem that the contradiction which exists between the aristocratic function of art and the democratic structure of modern society…

— Herbert Read

If we persist in our restless desire to know everything about the universe and ourselves, then we must not be afraid of…

— Herbert Read

The classicist, and the naturalist who has much in common with him, refuse to see in the highest works of art anything…

— Herbert Read

Fantasy is a product of thought, Imagination of sensibility. If the thinking, discursive mind turns to speculation, the result isFantasy; if, however,…

— Herbert Read

An entertainment is something which distracts us or diverts us from the routine of daily life. It makes us for the time…

— Herbert Read

Art is always the index of social vitality, the moving finger that records the destiny of a civilization. A wise statesman should…

— Herbert Read

Sentir mon Cœur is a privilege only granted to the exceptional man - the one who has the ability to find words…

— Herbert Read

The greatest intensification of the horrors of war is a direct result of the democratisation of the State. So long as the…

— Herbert Read

“Magic is not, and never has been a substitute for science, but is rather a constructive activity with a specific social function,…

— Herbert Read

An enormous amount of art and literature is erotic in the sense that it stimulates vague sexual emotions, but it has no…

— Herbert Read

In a sense, every tool is a machine--the hammer, the ax, and the chisel. And every machine is a tool. The real…

— Herbert Read

“There is a current misconception which sees in Jung an early disciple of Freud who subsequently deserted his master. Nothing could be…

— Herbert Read

Works of art must persist as objects of contemplation.

— Herbert Read

Simplicity is not a goal, but one arrives at simplicity in spite of oneself, as one approaches the real meaning of things.

— Herbert Read

Nobody seriously believes in the social philosophies of the immediate past.

— Herbert Read

Progress is measured by the degree of differentiation within a society.

— Herbert Read

The work of art... is an instrument for tilling the human psyche, that it may continue to yield a harvest of vital…

— Herbert Read

Great changes in the destiny of mankind can be effected only in the minds of little children.

— Herbert Read