Great Throughts Treasury

"True artistic renewal does not mean being stripped of fetters. It means moving into new fetters."

"In the past, traditional art was based on making manifest what is enduring in man, like love, jealously, hatred, envy and greed… Today art has to look again at these unchanging qualities, because society is no longer unchanging. It is up to art today to show us what has become of these unchanging qualities in the world which is moving and changing."

"We are moving. We are traveling at a remarkable speed, but we also carry with us our old baggage which is fit for the journey."

"Ahhh! The Sky, Heaven and Hell..Those three words were known in the East..Once you take them out of our earthly world, the whole world will fall apart..all the masterpieces we have made would sound and look platitude. I know the West now is an object of admiration for its science and discoveries but what does it worth judging by the greatest discoveries that were found in the east?! Verily the West is exploring the Earth and the East is exploring the Sky."

"There is always a state of anxiety, of searching and delving for style."

"An open space in the city during the time of the Mamluk Sultans. On one side there is a mosque with a minaret; on the other, a tavern. In the center is a house with a balcony. Dawn is about to break and silence reigns. A stake has been set up to which a man, condemned to death, has been tied. His executioner is nearby trying to fight off sleep."

"When the artist ... intends from the beginning to be obscure and take obscurity as his objective or goal for its own sake and wishes to astonish, shock, and seem mysterious, that is a swindle."

"What I was utterly convinced of, and still am, is the idea that the only responsibility the free intellectual has is vis-a-vis himself. He is not responsible to either a political party or a ruler."