#mage

It was her first book, an indigo cover with a silver moonflower, an art nouveau flower, I traced my finger along the silver line like smoke, whiplash curves. ... I touched the pages her hands touched, I pressed them to my lips, the soft thick old paper, yellow now, fragile as skin. I stuck my nose between the bindings and smelled all the readings she had given, the smell of unfiltered cigarettes and the espresso machine, beaches and incense and whispered words in the night. I could hear her voice rising from the pages. The cover curled outward like sails. ↗

— Janet Fitch

#silver #smell #wanting #art

At issue for Peladan is the potency of the visual image: art's ability to construct images for viewing that can mobilize, concentrate and redirect instinctive responses. He brings out into the open the recognition underlying all decadent art; that is, the political function of the fascinated gaze. ↗

— Jennifer Birkett

#decadent #gaze #image #peladan #art

People today are trying to hang on to the dignity of man, but they do not know how to, because they have lost the truth that man is made in the image of God. . . . We are watching our culture put into effect the fact that when you tell men long enough that they are machines, it soon begins to show in their actions. You see it in our whole culture -- in the theater of cruelty, in the violence in the streets, in the death of man in art and life. ↗

— Francis A. Schaeffer

#violence #art

Media images seem to play a critical role in shaping the cultural ideal of beauty and attractiveness through advertising, retailing, and the entertainment industry ↗

— Jaehee Jung

#beauty

The human body is the best work of art. ↗

— Jess C. Scott

#beauty #body #body-image #dancer #desire

'The Sound of Music' did more damage to the industry than any other picture. Everyone tried to copy it. We were the biggest offenders. ↗

— Richard D. Zanuck

#biggest #copy #damage #did #everyone

There is nothing more rare, nor more beautiful, than a woman being unapologetically herself; comfortable in her perfect imperfection. To me, that is the true essence of beauty. ↗

— Steve Maraboli

#beauty #body-image #comfortable #happiness #imperfection

One is never over-dressed or underdressed with a Little Black Dress. ↗

— Karl Lagerfeld

#chanel #class #dressing #fashion-designer #image

their heart grew cold they let their wings down ↗

— Sappho

#defeat #giving-in #giving-up #imagery #poetry

Having a purpose is the little secret of the nonpretties. Something to do always beats something to look at. ↗

— Adriana Trigiani

#conceit #pretty #self-confidence #self-image #southern-lit