Zhang Yimou Quotes

Theater publicly reveals the human condition through appealing to both intellect and emotion. Architecture, whether lowly or exalted, can do the same.

Works of art are like a Trojan horse. Under the surface is always some artist's deeply held philosophy on their view of the world. But on the other hand, you do not want to make it feel like medicine. You do not want to make it feel like an afternoon TV special where you're trying to hammer a message into someone's head.

...The more a picture has to give, the greater it is.

Is the Mona Lisa an 'accurate' representation of the actual human model for the painting? Who knows? Who cares? It's a great piece of art. It moves us. It makes us wonder, makes us gape - finally makes us look inward at ourselves.

Music and language are a vital element. We, as actors and directors, offer it to people who want to experience it. Sometimes the actual meaning is less important than the words themselves.

I don't believe that art is just for entertainment. I want to create art that is meaningful in some way.

What interests me most is when a work of art is no longer just an object, but also touches reality and life.

I like to look at everything and appreciate seeing the different things that have meaning to people.

All good performance pieces have some philosophical validity. That's the difference between mere theater and performance art.

It is important to consider that the horror movies should - like modern art - not have a too obvious meaning. When you watch them, it is more important what you feel than what you understand.

If art is not to be life-enhancing, what is it to be?

I think art parallels life; it is not a report on nature or on intimate disclosure of inner secrets. Color, in my opinion, behaves like man -- in two distinct ways: first in self-realization and then in the realization of relationships with others.

Even luxuries are arranged according to ideas and ideals, to make them reflect as much of thought-life as possible - and this is Art.

A work of art rests its merits in traditional qualities. It may constitute a remarkable feat in craftsmanship; it may be a searching study of psychological states; it may be a nostalgic glance backward; it may be any one of an infinite number of concepts, none of which may have any possible bearing upon its degree of newness.

A picture, to be an interesting picture, must be more than a picture, otherwise it is only a reproduction of an object, and not an object of value in itself.

The purpose of all art is to cause a deep and emotion, also one that is entertaining or pleasing. Out of the depth and entertainment comes value.

What we must demand from the photographer is the ability to put such a caption beneath his picture as will rescue it from the ravages of modishness and confer upon it a revolutionary use value.

In the eighteenth century, it was ladies and gentlemen and swings in a garden; today, it may be Campbell's soup cans or highway signs. There is no real difference. The artist still takes his everyday world and tries to make something out of it.

I think art can reflect tragedy.

No matter how much we scorn it, kitsch is an integral part of the human condition.

Art is one thing that can go on mattering once it has stopped hurting.

I like to think the movies that I've picked have something worthwhile to say. Something relevant.

I do believe architecture, and all art, should be content-driven. It should have something to say beyond the sensational.

Art is moral passion married to entertainment. Moral passion without entertainment is propaganda, and entertainment without moral passion is television.

I mean, art for art's sake is ridiculous. Art is for the sake of one's needs.