Aesthetic Standards Quotes

If you tell an ugly woman that she is beautiful, you offer her the great homage of corrupting the concept of beauty.

The first question I ask myself when something doesn't seem to be beautiful is why do I think it's not beautiful. And very shortly you discover that there is no reason.

A new artist today has to get their teeth fixed, has to tighten their jeans up, and they have to get 'em the right kind of hat, and if anything's wrong with their nose, if it's a little crooked, it's got to be straightened up.

I've seen many films, and many beautiful films. And I try to keep a certain level of quality of my films. I don't do commercials, I don't do films pre-prepared by other people, I don't do star system. So I do my own little thing.

There are various orders of beauty, causing men to make fools of themselves in various styles.

I think the idea of the social construction of beauty - this idea that beauty is simply whatever culture or society says it is - is on the run. Of course, beauty does arise in a cultural context. No one ever denies that. But there's also a natural response people have to it.

The reason 'Detox' didn't come out was because I didn't like it.

I put pressure on myself and feel pressure from my fans to not only win but to look great doing it.

Regardless of the medium, be it television or feature or documentary, I'm not gonna distinguish and worry about my particular canon, whatever that means.

Democracy is fatal for the arts; it leads only to chaos or the achievement of new and lower common denominators of quality.

I don't care what you say about me if I don't find you physically attractive.

I grew up in a renaissance period, a very lucky time when the greatest music ever made was also the most commercial. We'll never see that again, so for me, there's only one criteria, which is greatness. That's all I care about. Is what I'm doing reaching for greatness? Whether I achieve it or not, that is one hundred percent of my criteria.

The fact is that pictures which are unlike reality ought not be approved, and even if they are technically fine, this is no reason why they should offhand be judged to be correct, if their subject is lacking in the principles of reality carried out with no violations.

I believe that bad taste is vulgar. It's like cursing. I think the world can be saved through design, because what is the most distasteful thing someone can do? Kill someone. So, good taste is the opposite of that.

I think that the ideal physique and look of a ballerina is always changing with different eras. And it's continuing to change.

Only when painting isn't painting can there be an affront to modesty.

I'd love to have written a film and it to be regarded as good. I'd just like to be doing things that are good, really. I think that's all you can aim for. I find it odd when actors say they just want to do films or plays or television. A lot of films aren't very good; a lot of television isn't very good; a lot of plays aren't very good.

I'd rather not make films than make bad ones.

Critics are more committed to the rules of art than artists are.

If certain critics and poetasters had their way, 'Ordinary Piety' and its child, Dullness, would be the masters of poetry.

And "classically not beautiful" is a fancy term for saying ugly. And denouncing you. And erasing you.

in architecture, mediocrity is more glaringly obvious than in other lines - because there's a huge, physical object such as a building to demonstrate it.

I'm sure you have heard it said that appearance does not matter so much, and that it is what's on the inside that counts. This is, of course, utter nonsense, because if it were true then people who were good on this inside would would never have to comb their hair or take a bath, and the whole world would smell even worse than it already does.

I just think the Kardashians have an absence of taste and I don’t think that that should be perpetuated. I’m sorry I’m sounding like an old farty, snob, but it bothers me.

Well, Daddy, I used to believe that artists went crazy in the process of creating the beautiful works of art that kept society sane. Nowadays, though, artists make intentionally ugly art that’s only supposed to reflect society rather than inspire it. So I guess we’re all loony together now, loony rats in the shithouse of commercialism.