Art is the imposing of a pattern on experience, and our aesthetic enjoyment in recognition of the pattern.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- Art creates order from chaos. We enjoy art when we recognize the pattern the artist made.
- In plain terms
- Art organizes experiences into patterns we can recognize.
- What can you take from it?
- Find or create patterns to make sense of experiences.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- What pattern does this piece of art reveal?
Another view
Not all art relies on clear patterns or recognition.
More from Alfred North Whitehead
The ideas of Freud were popularized by people who only imperfectly understood them, who were incapable of the great effort required to grasp them in their rela…
Permalink to quote #57 A philosopher of imposing stature doesn't think in a vacuum. Even his most abstract ideas are, to some extent, conditioned by what is or is not known in the ti…
Permalink to quote #59 What is morality in any given time or place? It is what the majority then and there happen to like, and immorality is what they dislike.
Permalink to quote #56
Related quotes
Poetry - No definition of poetry is adequate unless it be poetry itself. The most accurate analysis by the rarest wisdom is yet insufficient, and the poet will…
Henry David ThoreauHenry David Thoreau quote #17 Nothing touches a work of art so little as words of criticism : they always result in more or less fortunate misunderstandings. Things aren't all so tangible a…
Rainer Maria RilkeRainer Maria Rilke quote #30 What the overemphasis on the idea of content entails is the perennial, never consummated project of interpretation. And, conversely, it is the habit of approac…
Susan SontagSusan Sontag quote #41