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A total work of art is only possible in the context of the whole of society. Everyone will be a necessary co-creator of a social architecture, and, so long as anyone cannot participate, the ideal form of democracy has not been reached. Whether people are artists, assemblers of machines or nurses, it is a matter of participating in the whole.

Joseph Beuys

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Joseph Beuys
Age: 64 †
Born: 1921
Born: May 12
Died: 1986
Died: January 23
Artist
Choreographer
Conceptual Artist
Illustrator
Painter
Performance Artist
Photographer
Sculptor
University Teacher
Crefeld
J. Beuys
Jozef Bojs
Iosef Boĭs
Josef Beuys
Joseph Heinrich Beuys
People
Social
Necessary
Reached
Art
Democracy
Ideal
Cannot
Possible
Total
Form
Anyone
Architecture
Nurses
Matter
Society
Creator
Participating
Whole
Whether
Machines
Participate
Work
Everyone
Ideals
Nurse
Long
Artist
Artists
Context

More quotes by Joseph Beuys

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I think the tree is an element of regeneration which in itself is a concept of time. The oak is especially so because it is a slowly growing tree with a kind of really solid heartwood. It has always been a form of sculpture, a symbol for this planet.
Joseph Beuys
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The ego must be developed, not for its own sake, but because it is needed by society. If you are only interested in self-realization then you cannot make a good painting. To do this you have to have thought about forming, and about how ideas of forming stem from history.
Joseph Beuys
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Art alone makes life possible - this is how radically I should like to formulate it. I would say that without art man is inconceivable in physiological terms... Even the act of peeling a potato can be an artistic act if it is consciously done.
Joseph Beuys
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Art can no longer be art today if it does not reach into the heart of our present culture and work transformatively within it that is, an art which cannot mould society — and through this naturally operate upon the core questions of our society — is not art.
Joseph Beuys
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Where would I have ended up if I had been intelligent?
Joseph Beuys
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To be a teacher is my greatest work of art.
Joseph Beuys
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For instance, in places like universities, where everyone speaks so rationally, it is necessary for a kind of enchanter to appear.
Joseph Beuys
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Let's talk of a system that transforms all the social organisms into a work of art, in which the entire process of work is included... something in which the principle of production and consumption takes on a form of quality. It's a Gigantic project.
Joseph Beuys
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Every human being is an artist
Joseph Beuys
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I think the tree is an element of regeneration which in itself is a concept of time.
Joseph Beuys
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Every man is an artist.
Joseph Beuys
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Man is really not freeing many aspects. He is dependent on his social circumstances, but he is free in his thinking, and here is the point of origin of sculpture. For me the formation of the thought is already sculpture. The thought is sculpture.
Joseph Beuys
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Art for me is the science of freedom.
Joseph Beuys
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Truth must be found in reality, not systems.
Joseph Beuys
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Art is not there simply to be understood. ... It is more the sense of an indication or suggestion.
Joseph Beuys