Alison

“On a typical day, it is easy to glance at strangers and forget the most fundamental things about them: that they’re just as real as you are; that they’ve triumphed and suffered; that like you they’re engaged in something (living) that is hard and rich and brief.”
― Patrick Bringley, All the Beauty in the World: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Me

“Eight of the ten commandments are about what thou shalt not. But you can live a whole life not doing any of that stuff and still avoid doing any good. That’s the whole crisis. The rot at the root of everything. The belief that goodness is built on a constructed absence, not-doing. That belief corrupts everything, has everyone with any power sitting on their hands.”
― Kaveh Akbar, Martyr!

“The only people who speak in certainties are zealots and tyrants.”
― Kaveh Akbar, Martyr!

“A graceful, broken body, it reminds us again of the obvious: that we’re mortal, that we suffer, that bravery in suffering is beautiful, that loss inspires love and lamentation. This part of the painting performs the work of sacred art, putting us in direct touch with something we know intimately yet remains beyond our comprehension.”
― Patrick Bringley, All the Beauty in the World: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Me