Roger Scruton Quotes

Art is not meant to change the world.

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

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

I think there is a debate in the arts about, you know, whether we must strive for art for art's sake, and you know, kind of try to keep political debate out of our work. And to that I say, I'd like you to show me an example of, you know, this so-called apolitical art. I don't think there's any such thing.

Art should be life. It's an imitation of life. It should have some humanity in it.

Art is not a form of propaganda; it is a form of truth.

For most of us, art is supposed to do something more than simply mirror the confusions of the world.

The power of works of art still continues to be secretly nourished by imitation... kitsch

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

The value of art lies in its power to increase our moral force or establish its heightening influence.

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.

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.

Art is a habit-forming drug. Art has absolutely no existence as veracity, as truth. People always speak of it with this great, religious reverence, but why should it be so revered?

The value of art is in the observer.

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

The essential function of art is moral. But a passionate, implicit morality, not didactic. A morality which changes the blood, rather than the mind.

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

I believe in broken, fractured, complicated narratives, but I believe in narratives as a vehicle for truth, not simply as a form of entertainment, though I love entertainment, but also a way of conveying what needs to be conveyed about the works that I care about.

I believe that true art is universal in its appeal.

Art matters.

Art is not an end in itself, but a means of addressing humanity.

Without art, the crudeness of reality would make the world unbearable.

Art is much less important than life, but what a poor life without it.

A work of art has no importance whatever to society. It is only important to the individual.

Art evokes emotion. It doesn't have to be a thing of beauty.