Great Art Springs From a Non-Artistic Motivation

Great art springs from a non-artistic motivation; great art is what it becomes after being shaped by the artist. Making art for the sake of making it can only beget lesser art, and the examples are so abundant that it is correct to say that superior art will always be, to a greater or lesser extent, autobiographical. One does not need to know Shakespeare’s biography to know him, since his work proves what issues his mind was occupied with while he was alive. Shakespeare would not be who he is if he conceived his plays from the artistic effect he intended to produce; just as Dostoevsky would never have the same vitality if he wrote novels from “artistic motives”. Art is the form given to a motivation that does not require an artist to manifest itself—or to understand it.