Herbert Read
Herbert Read
Sir Herbert Edward Read, DSO, MCwas an English art historian, poet, literary critic and philospher, best known for numerous books on art, which included influential volumes on the role of art in education. Read was co-founder of the Institute of Contemporary Arts. He was one of the earliest English writers to take notice of existentialism...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPoet
art men giving
Modern man has been in search of a new language of form to satisfy new longings and aspirations - longings for mental appeasement, aspirations to unity, harmony, serenity - an end to his alienation from nature. All these arts of remote times or strange cultures either give or suggest to the modern artist forms which he can adapt to his needs, the elements of a new iconography.
art social-values giving
Art is not and never has been subordinate to moral values. Moral values are social values; aesthetic values are human values. Morality seeks to restrain the feelings; art seeks to define them by externalizing them, by giving them significant form. Morality has only one aim - the ideal good; art has quite another aim - the objective truth... art never changes.
earliest group nomadic point primitive records species
The earliest records of our species point to group organizations - the primitive horde, nomadic tribes, settlements, communities, cities, nations.
military artist civilization
The worth of a civilization or a culture is not valued in the terms of its material wealth or military power, but by the quality and achievements of its representative individuals - its philosophers, its poets and its artists.
philosophy believe past
Nobody seriously believes in the social philosophies of the immediate past.
progress differentiation degrees
Progress is measured by the degree of differentiation within a society.
attitude political despair
The characteristic political attitude of today is not one of positive belief, but of despair.
miracle stillness
Love works miracles in stillness.
happiness may slave
The slave may be happy, but happiness is not enough.
umpires arbitration doe
I can imagine no society which does not embody some method of arbitration.
names anarchism knows
I know of no better name than Anarchism.
coherence degrees evolution
In the evolution of mankind there has always been a certain degree of social coherence.
destiny artist modern
The modern artist, by nature and destiny, is always an individualist.
philosophical feelings historical
The sense of historical continuity, and a feeling for philosophical rectitude cannot, however, be compromised.