INSPIRING QUOTATIONS
Here are quotations from artists and thinkers whose work resonates with your project. They might be useful for framing the game, inspiring players, or deepening your own sense of what you're making.
On Social Sculpture and Expanded Art
"Everyone is an artist." — Joseph Beuys
"To be a teacher is my greatest work of art." — Joseph Beuys
"The sculpture is not an object but a process in which the sculptor participates." — Joseph Beuys
"I am not an artist. I am a person who creates. There is a difference." — Joseph Beuys
On Participation and Collaboration
"The spectator is humble, the participant is active." — Marina Abramović
"Art is not a mirror held up to reality, but a hammer with which to shape it." — Bertolt Brecht
"The artist is not a special kind of person; rather each person is a special kind of artist." — Ananda Coomaraswamy (often quoted by Beuys)
"I want to activate the public. I don't want them to be passive. I want them to be active in the process of art." — Tania Bruguera
On Process and Ephemerality
"The process is the content, more than any fixed meaning." — Allan Kaprow
"The line between art and life should be kept as fluid, and perhaps indistinct, as possible." — Allan Kaprow
"Art that matters to us is art that disappears." — Robert Barry
"The work is not in the object. The work is in the experience." — Carolee Schneemann
On Wandering and Discovery
"We must try everything. We must try everything." — John Cage
"I can't understand why people are frightened of new ideas. I'm frightened of the old ones." — John Cage
"Not knowing what the next moment will bring is what makes life worth living." — John Cage
"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes." — Marcel Proust
On Gifts and Exchange
"A gift makes a connection." — Lewis Hyde
"The spirit of a gift is kept alive by its constant donation." — Lewis Hyde
"Art that matters to us is art that moves from the sphere of the commodity into the sphere of the gift." — Lewis Hyde
On Community and Connection
"Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much." — Helen Keller
"The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference." — Oscar Wilde
"We are all apprentices in a craft where no one becomes a master." — Ernest Hemingway
"The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed." — Carl Jung
On Play and Seriousness
"It is in playing, and only in playing, that the individual child or adult is able to be creative and to use the whole personality." — D.W. Winnicott
"We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing." — George Bernard Shaw
"The most serious thing is play." — Friedrich Schiller
"Creation is a drug I can't do without." — Cecil B. DeMille
On Risk and Courage
"Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature. Life is either a daring adventure or nothing." — Helen Keller
"And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom." — Anaïs Nin
"Creativity takes courage." — Henri Matisse
"Don't think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it's good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art." — Andy Warhol
On the City as Material
"The city is a collage." — Robert Rauschenberg
"I think of the city as a kind of laboratory." — Vito Acconci
"The street is the gallery." — Keith Haring
"Art should be something like a good walk." — Robert Smithson
On the Power of Small Acts
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has." — Margaret Mead
"Little by little, one travels far." — J.R.R. Tolkien
"The smallest act of kindness is worth more than the grandest intention." — Oscar Wilde
"Do something. If it works, do more. If it doesn't, do something else." — Franklin D. Roosevelt (adapted)
On Not Knowing
"Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves." — Rainer Maria Rilke
"The unknown was my compass. The unknown was my encyclopedia." — Anaïs Nin
"I have no special talent. I am only passionately curious." — Albert Einstein
"The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious." — Albert Einstein
On Art and Life
"Art is either plagiarism or revolution." — Paul Gauguin
"The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance." — Aristotle
"Art is the lie that enables us to realize the truth." — Pablo Picasso
"Life beats down and crushes the soul and art reminds you that you have one." — Stella Adler
On What Endures
"What we have done for ourselves alone dies with us; what we have done for others and the world remains and is immortal." — Albert Pike
"The influence of a beautiful, helpful, hopeful character is contagious and may revolutionize a whole community." — Anonymous
"Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life." — Pablo Picasso
"The purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls." — Pablo Picasso