The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and conceal the artist is art's aim.
Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault.
Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For these there is hope.
There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.
The morality of art consists in the perfect use of an imperfect medium.
No artist desires to prove anything.
No artist is ever morbid. The artist can express everything.
All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. Those who read the symbol do so at their peril.
It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.
When critics disagree, the artist is in accord with himself. We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely.
Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault.
Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For these there is hope.
There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.
The morality of art consists in the perfect use of an imperfect medium.
No artist desires to prove anything.
No artist is ever morbid. The artist can express everything.
All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. Those who read the symbol do so at their peril.
It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.
When critics disagree, the artist is in accord with himself. We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely.
All art is quite useless.
OSCAR WILDE, 1891