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Rudolf Arnheim

Rudolf Arnheim Quotes

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Famous Rudolf Arnheim Quotes

“Television is a new, hard test of our wisdom. If we succeed in mastering the new medium it will enrich us. But it can also put our mind to sleep. We must not forget that in the past the inability to transport immediate experience and to convey it to others made the use of language necessary and thus compelled the human mind to develop concepts. For in order to describe things one must draw the general from the specific; one must select, compare, think. When communication can be achieved by pointing with the finger, however, the mouth grows silent, the writing hand stops, and the mind shrinks.”

IfsThinkingWritingMindHumansMadeHardUseHandsPastOrderLanguageGrowsSleepForgetTelevisionCommunicationSucceedDrawsMouthsConceptsTestsSilentFingersMediumsCompareHuman MindCompelledInabilityPointingShrinksSelectTransportUse Of Language
Book:Film as Art
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“It would be most wholesome if for at least twenty years art historians were forbidden to refer to any derivations. If they were not allowed to account for a work of art mainly by tracing where it comes from, they would have to deal with it in and by itself--which is what they are most needed for.”

IfsYearsArtWould BeDealsNeededAccountsTwentiesWorks Of ArtHistorianForbiddenTracing
Book:Parables of Sun Light: Observations on Psychology, the Arts, and the Rest
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“From building a fire one can learn something about artistic composition. If you use only small kindling and large logs, the fire will quickly eat up the small pieces but will not become strong enough to attack the large ones. You must supply a scale of sizes from the smallest to the largest. The human eye also will not make its way into a painting or building unless a continuum of shapes leads from the small to the large, from the large to the small.”

IfsWayHumansEnoughUseEyeStrongFirePiecesBuildingPaintingShapesSizeScalesArtisticSmallestCompositionStrong EnoughContinuumHuman EyesSmall PiecesKindling
Author:Rudolf Arnheim
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