Abstract

Famous quotes containing the word abstract:

    Just as a chemist “isolates” a substance from contaminations that distort his view of its nature and effects, so the work of art purifies significant appearance. It presents abstract themes in their generality, but not reduced to diagrams.
    Rudolf Arnheim (b. 1904)

    ... my whole existence is governed by abstract ideas.... the ideal must be preserved regardless of fact.
    Mary Corinna Putnam (1842–1906)

    One of the fundamental reasons why so many doctors become cynical and disillusioned is precisely because, when the abstract idealism has worn thin, they are uncertain about the value of the actual lives of the patients they are treating. This is not because they are callous or personally inhuman: it is because they live in and accept a society which is incapable of knowing what a human life is worth.
    John Berger (b. 1926)