1960s, The American Promise (1965)
“The idea of an isolated American painting, so popular in this country during the thirties, seems absurd to me, just as the idea of a purely American mathematics or physics would seem absurd... And in another sense, the problem doesn't exist at all; or, if it did, would solve itself: An American is an American and his painting would naturally be qualified by the fact, whether he wills or not. But the basic problems of contemporary painting are independent of any one country.”
As quoted in Abstract Expressionism: Creators and Critics, ed. Clifford Ross, Abrahams Publishers, New York, 1990, p. 138
1940's, Art and Architecture (1944)
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Jackson Pollock 33
American artist 1912–1956Related quotes
James Samuel Coleman; as cited in: Wilbur Schramm, The Beginnings of Communication Study in America: A Personal Memoir 1998, p. 63; About Paul Lazarsfeld.
(June, 1888) in Letters to Émile Bernard (1938) New York. See also John Rewald, History of Impressionism (1946) p. 402.
1880s, 1888
“The idea of American exceptionalism doesn't extend to Americans being exceptional.”
New York Times column (September 20, 2008)
2000s, The Real Abraham Lincoln: A Debate (2002), Q&A
Context: It was a terrible war. The idea that the cost of the war is due to Lincoln is simply absurd. It was a terrible war because the country was deeply divided, and the question of the future of the nation, whether or not it would be based upon principles recognized as principles of individual liberty, or whether the idea of one race dominating another race would be accepted as a means for governance. Let me just read one short statement here that might interest you. "Since the Civil War, in which the Southern States were conquered, against all historical logic and sound sense, the American people have been in a condition of political and popular decay.... The beginnings of a great new social order based on the principle of slavery and inequality were destroyed by that war, and with them also the embryo of a future truly great America." That has been the position of defenders of the Confederacy from Alexander Stephens through Thomas DiLorenzo. Do you know the man who said that was Adolf Hitler?
Source: 1956 - 1967, Art-as-Art Dogma' part II, (1964), p. 157
2010s, The Scariest Reason Trump Won (2016)
The Education of Henry Adams (1907)