Should we really divide the world into only two sides: black and white, the good and bad?
Below are black and white quotes that will definitely help us get to the bottom of it.
Some people really have that black and white perspective on life, only seeing right and wrong.
Some of these life quotes testify that there is absolutely nothing wrong with that, with being realistic.
However, there are others who choose to see the grey in between black and white. And indeed, what’s wrong with being a little optimistic?
What’s wrong with choosing to believe that there are some grey things in between – with adding some color to our lives?
Absolutely nothing again. We all deserve to be happy.
That’s why these motivational quotes will make you embrace the various shades life presents and encourage you to lead a more colorful, cheerful life.
Black And White Inspirational Quotes
1. “Books bring alluring colors to our mundane black and white world.” – Caleb Reese
2. “Relations between black and white would be greatly improved if we were more accepting of our fears and our feelings and more vocal about it.” – Sarah Silverman
3. “Black and white color, as if curiosity and contentment ran through a blender.” – Vikrmn
4. “Life is never straightforward or emotionally black and white.” – Christopher Meloni
5. “Smile so damn bright that even black and white can’t dull your shine.” – Tilicia Haridat
6. “The world is in color, you have to work at black and white.” – Andrew Maclean
7. “Life is not black and white; there is some gray nuance to it.” – Pilou Asbaek
8. “Work-life balance be like black and white color; appropriately proportioned to perfection.” – Vikrmn
9. “Human nature is not black and white but black and grey.” – Graham Greene
10. “Good and bad times are like black and white color, incomplete without each other.” – Vikrmn
11. “Don’t ever let the light of your soul dim, even if the world seems black and white.” – Tilicia Haridat
12. “I think if you live in a black-and-white world, you’re gonna suffer a lot. I used to be like that. But I don’t believe that anymore.” – Bradley Cooper
13. “Things are always either black or white. The grey in between is only a confusion.” – Ljupka Cvetanova
14. “There is no black-and-white situation. It’s all part of life. Highs, lows, middles.” – Van Morrison
15. “We’re so quick to go to make things black and white, and to put things in their box. But everything is this mixture – and that’s what this world is – is this blend of different things.” – Matisyahu
16. “Black and white, severally incomplete and at the same time completely several.” – Vikrmn
17. “When we don’t have information, we go to the simplest outlook, to black and white. But then we have to lie to ourselves. Black is never as black as you’re painting it and white is never as white.” – Patricia Sun
18. “The great thing about getting older is that you become more mellow. Things aren’t as black and white, and you become much more tolerant. You can see the good in things much more easily rather than getting enraged as you used to do when you were young.” – Maeve Binchy
19. “Nothing is truly black or white. But everything is absolutely God’s glory or self glory. The less we glorify God, the more we do self glorification and act black or white. The more we give back glory to God in all we do, the more He empowers us living less in black or white.” – Unknown
20. “Don’t define your world in black and white because there is so much hiding amongst the greys.” – Unknown
21. “Love and hate, like black and white, always complement each other.” – Vikrmn
22. “Everything’s not black and white. We choose to make bad decisions or not.” – Will Arnett
23. “Black and white is salt and pepper of colors, for life tastes bland without them.” – Vikrmn
24. “Life is in color, but black and white is more realistic.” – Samuel Fuller
25. “I’ve noticed that truth is very rarely found in the extremes, in the black and white – you’ll usually find it right in the middle, in the gray. It’s just much harder to find that way.” – Cole Ryan
26. “Some people like living in black and white worlds. Let them stay there. Appreciate all the colors you see in your world though.” – Ashly Lorenzana
27. “It’s about you. If you win, it’s you; if you lose, it’s you. Black and white. Nowhere to hide.” – Greg Rusedski
28. “Being glamorous is about strength and confidence. It’s black and white – dramatic. You have to be strong.” – Catherine Zeta-Jones
29. “A country where there are no freedoms is a black and white country; it is colorless and lifeless. Such a country needs nothing but colors, nothing but freedoms!” – Mehmet Murat İldan
Deep Black And White Quotes
1. “I believe very strongly that when it comes to desire, when it comes to attraction, that things are never black and white, things are very much shades of grey.” – Brian Molko
2. “When I was a little girl, everything in the world fell into either of these two categories: wrong or right. Black or white. Now that I am an adult, I have put childish things aside and now I know that some things fall into wrong and some things fall into right. Some things are categorized as black and some things are categorized as white. But most things in the world aren’t either! Most things in the world aren’t black, aren’t white, aren’t wrong, aren’t right, but most of everything is just different. And now I know that there’s nothing wrong with different, and that we can let things be different, we don’t have to try and make them black or white, we can just let them be grey. And when I was a child, I thought that God was the God who only saw black and white. Now that I am no longer a child, I can see that God is the God who can see the black and the white and the grey, too, and He dances on the grey! Grey is okay.” – C. JoyBell C.
3. “Life is a photo album half black and white, half color.” – Biju Karakkonam
4. “There are two kinds of people in the world – only two kinds. Not black or white, rich or poor, but those either dead in sin or dead to sin.” – Leonard Ravenhill
5. “The most colorful thing in the world is black and white, it contains all colors and at the same time excludes all.” – Vikrmn
6. “I write to make peace with the things I cannot control. I write to create red in a world that often appears black and white. I write to discover. I write to uncover…” – Terry Tempest Williams
7. “The ignorance of the world often makes people believe that life should be black and white – that you must choose sides – and so the world of colourful gradients goes unadmired.” – A.J. Darkholme
8. “There are only two forces at work in this world – black and white. Only people are grey.” – Chris Heimerdinger
9. “I’ve always thought that I’ve been strong in what I believe in. Not that I know what I believe for absolutely everything, but the things that I do believe, it’s very black and white, and yes and no.” – Kay Panabaker
10. “In the beginning, some people try to appear that everything about them is ‘in black and white’ until later their true colors come out.” – Anthony Liccione
11. “It’s not easy taking your own advice, accepting what you don’t like hearing, & seeing the grey amongst the black & white.” – April Mae Monterrosa
12. “When I learned about the gray existing between the black and white of absolute terms, I began to experience more peace. The more I expanded my gray areas (more than 50 shades), the more peace I experienced in my life.” – David W. Earle LPC
13. “Loo, life is black and white. You don’t know what’s good for you, because you don’t see the black and white! You don’t see where the black lines end and where the white lines begin! You’re going to grow up to be no good if you keep on that way. It’s impractical. I only have one child, and I won’t have her growing up to be impractical. I can’t think of a worse thing to be than impractical!” – C. JoyBell C.
14. “Life isn’t black and white. It’s a million gray areas, don’t you find?” – Ridley Scott
15. “Love is like black and white color; falling for same person, over and again.” – Vikrmn
16. “When you’re the victim of the behavior, it’s black and white; when you’re the perpetrator, there are a million shades of gray.” – Laura Schlessinger
17. “Relationships are not straight forward. They’re not black and white. Sometimes things don’t always going [sic] in a straight line, and that’s okay. Love can be very confusing.” – Danica McKellar
18. “The more I learn color the more I love black and white.” – Sajal Sazzad
19. “It’s not hard to get your way when it’s your way or the highway. People either follow suit or they’re not around. I don’t really like the sound of that, ’cause that sounds like a temper tantrum. I’m just very black and white when it comes to my business. There’s really no gray area.” – Nicki Minaj
20. “‘Nothing is ever black and white, Nila. You should know that by now. It’s all how you survive the grey.’” – Pepper Winters
21. “Black and white is mix of toughest simplicity and easiest complexity.” – Vikrmn
22. “In tragedy, it’s hard to find a good resolution; it’s not black and white: it’s a big fog of gray.” – Paul Dano
23. “For grey matter, there is no black and white. If you think in black and white, then you do not use enough brain functions.” – Petek Kabakci
24. “The world doesn’t see a lot of gray. The world sees black and white, and then it understands.” – George C. Wolfe
25. “Things are not quite so simple always as black and white.” – Doris Lessing
26. “More than anything she wanted the world to be uncomplicated, for right and wrong to be as easily divided as the black and white sections of an Oreo. But the world was not a cookie.” – Roshani Chokshi
27. “Diversity doesn’t mean black and white only.” – Henry Louis Gates
28. “I believe I live in a black and white. I think things are like either black or white. I don’t really believe that much in the gray. I think that there’s gray for a lot of people, but I don’t live in the gray. I realize whatever action I have or take, it’s going to have a consequence – either good or bad. So I live my life in a way where I don’t have bad consequences. I just notice there’s a lot of people around me who just live in the gray. I don’t know, for me, I’m just really straightforward.” – Venus Williams
29. “Black and white seems a journey into space which is destined back to earth.” – Vikrmn
30. “The truth never had any shades of grey – there was always a discernible line between black and white.” – Kenneth Eade
31. “People don’t change. There are two kinds of people in the world: winners and losers. Black and white. I don’t know where gray fits in, or if you can even live in that shade.” – Julie Anne Peters
32. “Black and white thinking limits understanding and feedback, two necessary ingredients for successful resolution in creative conflict and successful understanding.” – David W. Earle
33. “The Sophisticate: ‘The world isn’t black and white. No one does pure good or pure bad. It’s all gray. Therefore, no one is better than anyone else.’ The Zetet: ‘Knowing only gray, you conclude that all grays are the same shade. You mock the simplicity of the two-color view, yet you replace it with a one-color view…’” – Marc Stiegler
34. “The human brain works as a binary computer and can only analyze the exact information-based zeros and ones (or black and white). Our heart is more like a chemical computer that uses fuzzy logic to analyze information that can’t be easily defined in zeros and ones.” – Naveen Jain
35. “My philosophy, like color television, is all there in black and white” – Monty Python
36. “I never realised before how much of a jurist I am. I try to bring everything back to the basics, to black-and-white situations. The world is not a rainbow.” – Danny Mekić
37. “Our lives at times seem a study in contrast… love and hate, birth and death, right and wrong… everything seen in absolutes of black and white. Too often we are not aware that it is the shades of grey that add depth and meaning to the starkness of those extremes.” – Ansel Adams
38. “The natural response of the old-timers is to build a strong moral wall against the outside. This is where the world starts to be painted in black and white, saints inside, and sinners outside the wall.” – Mary Douglas
39. “Light is meaningful only in relation to darkness, and truth presupposes error. It is these mingled opposites which people our life, which make it pungent, intoxicating. We only exist in terms of this conflict, in the zone where black and white clash.” – Louis Aragon
40. “I don’t look at things in black and white. There are big gray areas. There’s a lot of slippage.” – Mark Bradford
Black And White Photography Quotes
Most people would agree that black and white photography is definitely one of the most powerful.
It has the ability to evoke nostalgia and at the same time, it brings us so much tranquility.
Here’s a collection of inspirational quotes about B&W photography below.
1. “Working in black and white makes me feel like a painter, not a photographer. Shooting this way allows me to focus my attention on the light and shade, textures, shapes and expressions. It’s really a matter of personal choice, but in my opinion black and white can lead to a more abstract reading of reality, which is arguably more demanding and more challenging to produce. Here photographers cannot use flattering colours or coloured light to distract the eye. You cannot cheat in black and white.” – Guy Gagnon
2. “When shooting a portrait in black and white you are not distracted by the colours and it is much less confused; this allows me to capture the character of my sitter. My portraits are very calm and, I hope, timeless. I strive to make each portrait a true reflection of the individual.” – Antonia Deutsch
3. “Black and white photography has an enhanced sobriety and gravitas that can be well suited to formal events such as weddings.” – Tim Savage
4. “Nothing conveys mood and emotion quite like a good black and white image. But simply removing colour from an image is unlikely to achieve this.” – Robin Whalley
5. “When you photograph people in color, you photograph their clothes. But when you photograph people in Black and white, you photograph their souls!” – Ted Grant
6. “Take your time with your composition; black and white images need to be strong to work well. With my black and white images I am always looking for bold textures, contrast between layers and lines in the composition to draw my viewers through the image.” – Helen Rushton
7. “I believe that the essence of photography is black and white. Color is but a deviance.” – Sarah Moon
8. “Maybe black and white is the best medium for landscapes, I don’t know.” – Fay Godwin
9. “For me, the subtlety of black and white inspires the imagination of the individual viewer to complete the picture in the mind’s eye. It doesn’t attempt to compete with the outside world. I believe it is calmer and gentler than colour, and persists longer in our visual memory.” – Michael Kenna
10. “When I shoot a photo I already know if the final image will be black and white or colour – it’s a matter of what expressive language you want for that project. Of course, some images are more suitable for black and white, especially high-contrasted images.” – Gian Marco Marano
11. “Between black and white there throbs the universe of chromatic phenomena.” – Johannes Itten
12. “I prefer black and white and portrait photography. I like old, you know, interesting faces, so I think black and white brings out the contrast.” – Brooklyn Beckham
13. “Only in black and white can I see the design and textures. I don’t consider color photography art. Black and white is an interpretation. Color is a duplication.” – Clyde Butcher
14. “Admiring black and white photos is often what first starts people out on their own road to becoming keen photographers.” – John Beardsworth
15. “Black and white pictures create a surreal magic!” –Avijeet Das
16. “Black and White allows me to detach from the cliche ‘souvenir photo’ approach to photography.” – Guy Gagnon
17. “Black and white photography has the potential to make any photographer a better photographer.” – Rob Sheppard
18. “While the absence of color may contribute to our appreciation, at the same time it is important to assert that black and white is not photography minus color. Not at all. It’s much more subtle than turning down the color saturation on your television.” – John Beardsworth
19. “One sees differently with color photography than black-and-white… In short, visualization must be modified by the specific nature of the equipment and materials being used.” – Ansel Adams
20. “In black and white there are more colors than color photography, because you are not blocked by any colors so you can use your experiences, your knowledge, and your fantasy, to put colors into black and white.” – Anders Petersen
21. “Let’s assume that all the cassettes of monochrome film Cartier-Bresson ever exposed had somehow been surreptitiously loaded with color film. I’d venture to say that about two thirds of his pictures would be ruined and the remainder unaffected, neither spoiled nor improved. And perhaps one in a thousand enhanced.” – Philip Jones Griffiths
22. “What I love about black & white photographs is that they’re more like reading the book than seeing the movie.” – Jennifer Price
23. “Black and white are the colors of photography. To me they symbolize the alternatives of hope and despair to which mankind is forever subjected.” – Robert Frank
24. “What the human eye sees is an illusion of what is real. The black and white image transforms illusions into another reality.” – Ruth Bernhard
25. “The special factor about black and white photography is that it doesn’t just copy the reality, but it represents it with its own language.” – Gian Marco Marano
26. “Everything always looked better in black and white. Everything always looked as if it were the first time; there’s always more people in a black and white photograph. It just makes it seem that there were more people at a gig, more people at a football match, than with color photography. Everything looks more exciting.” – Jack Lowden
27. “Black and white finds a new strength in unlikely subjects, taking away the distractions of colour and emphasising form, texture and shape.” – David Prakel
28. “One very important difference between color and monochromatic photography is this: in black and white you suggest; in color you state. Much can be implied by suggestion, but statement demands certainty… absolute certainty.” – Paul Outerbridge
29. “For me, Africa is a land of light and contrast. Black and white is the best way to express the solitary emotion and vitality of wildlife.” – Laurent Baheux
30. “Black and white photography erases time from the equation.” – Jason Peterson
31. “As a child, I used to watch old black and white movies and was captivated by the imagery. I think that this influenced my decision to specialise in black and white from an extremely early stage. For me black and white is a purer image which allows greater drama and more expression, be it a portrait or a landscape.” – Antonia Deutsch
32. “Which is probably the reason why I work exclusively in black and white – to highlight that contrast.” – Leonard Nimoy
33. “I think every subject deserves to be treated as just what they are, an individual. It’s quite often I will think ‘this is going to look great in black and white’ though. In fact, I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a black and white photograph and thought ‘that would look great in colour.’” – Dean Sherwood
34. “In the history of photography, we have many masterpieces in terms of black and white books. You have Bresson’s ‘Decisive Moment,’ Frank’s ‘The Americans’… many masterpieces. But there is nothing to this caliber in color. Well, I think I’ll waltz with my muse and hope that I might be able to produce something on this order in color.” – Ralph Gibson
35. “I make black and white prints because I want to go back to the beginning.” – Shiko Munakata
36. “I work in color sometimes, but I guess the images I most connect to, historically speaking, are in black and white. I see more in black and white – I like the abstraction of it.” – Mary Ellen Mark
37. “I think it’s because it was an emotional story, and emotions come through much stronger in black and white. Color is distracting in a way, it pleases the eye but it doesn’t necessarily reach the heart.” – Kim Hunter
38. “Black and white creates a strange dreamscape that color never can.” – Jack Antonoff
39. “Black and white is abstract; color is not. Looking at a black and white photograph, you are already looking at a strange world.” – Joel Sternfeld
40. “There’s something strange and powerful about black-and-white imagery.” – Stefan Kanfer
41. “For black and white landscapes I concentrate on the graphic elements of a scene, and the nature of the environment, whether it is stormy or tranquil.” – Antonia Deutsch
42. “With black and white photography, what you have to say counts more than the way you say it.” – Gian Marco Marano
43. “I enjoy using black and white when creating fashion images and portraits as it tends to isolate the model. When shooting black and white, it makes you think differently. Your mindset has to change from colour and you have to think in monochrome.” – James Nader
44. “It is always worth reflecting on why you are doing B&W. After all, making pictures black and white is a deliberate choice and there’s usually a bit more to it than a whim.” – John Beardsworth
45. “There are some locations I go to and they scream black and white to me because of the ambience. For me, great black and white images fall into two categories: very dramatic with stormy skies and bold compositions and at the other end of the spectrum a calm and minimalist composition.” – Helen Rushton
46. “In black and white there are more colors than color photography, because you are not blocked by any colors so you can use your experiences, your knowledge, and your fantasy, to put colors into black and white.” – Anders Petersen
47. “Architectural photography allows me to tame cities of iron and concrete and find a ‘charm’ within them. With my studio photography shooting plants and flowers, I can keep some affiliation with nature. These two themes often recur in my work and complement each other: the cold, sharp aesthetics and straight lines of architecture are opposed by the delicacy, curves, sensitivity and poetry of nature. These themes have influenced me to switch to the world of black and white to accentuate this darker but more poetic theme.” – Guy Gagnon
48. Black and white can transform a scene into something magical.” – Rob Sheppard
49. “When images are in black and white, they seem timeless. When you see Carrie Otis in an ad from 1989 next to an ad with Klara Wester from 2009, you don’t see a 20-year difference between the pictures.” – Paul Marciano
Black And White Quotes In Art And Film
1. “It is not that Shakespeare’s art is in technicolor and fancy, and that real life is black and white and tedious. The life that Shakespeare was living was the only life he had, and he had to use it to create what he was doing.” – Stephen Greenblatt
2. “Since I am from Spain, once the morning has gone, I like to take a nap while falling asleep to black and white movies. It feels less lonely. There is a comfort in hearing their voices, like when you’re a child and your mother tells you a story before bedtime.” – Jordi Molla
3. “Perhaps I am old-fashioned, but black and white films still hold an affectionate place in my heart; they have an incomparable mystique and mood.” – Ginger Rogers
4. “I’ve been forty years discovering that the queen of all colors is black.” – Henri Mattise
5. “If I could have had my own way, I would have confined myself to black and white.” – Edgar Degas
Black And White Quotes For Instagram
1. “Black and white, oldest of the vintages, newest of the last season.” – Vikrmn
2. “The black and white photographer is a musician, transposing notes on the fly, visualizing a final print from the world of color.” – Ted Dillard
3. “I don’t see the world completely in black and white. Sometimes I do.” – Benicio Del Toro
4. “Life’s not black-and-white. Sometimes the ends justifies the means.” – Emily Giffin
5. “To see in color is a delight for the eye but to see in black and white is a delight for the soul.” – Andri Cauldwell
6. “Life is better in black and white!” – Avijeet Das
7. “A good color picture is usually a good black and white too.” – John Beardsworth
8. “Black and white always looks modern.” – Karl Lagerfeld
9. “Black and white photography is truly quite a ‘departure from reality,’ and the transition from one aspect of visual magic to another was not as complete as many imagine.” – Ansel Adams
10. “From black and white to a sepia tone, some dreams come with a tint or in monochrome.” – Shing02
11. “Good black and white photography is not about the removal of color!” – Rob Sheppard
12. “No color will ever be brighter for me than black and white.” – Alessandro Del Piero
13. “Celluloid will be the next decade’s black and white.” – Danny Boyle
14. “Black and white is how it should be, but shades of grey are the colors I see.” – Billy Joel
15. “Colour is everything, black and white is more.” – Dominic Rouse
16. “Black and white always looks modern, whatever that word means.” – Karl Lagerfeld
17. “When I look into the crowd, I see young and old, black and white – it’s amazing that I’m able to connect with so many different kinds of people.” – Patti LaBelle
18. “Black and white might be sufficient. But why deprive yourself of color.” – Christian Dior
19. “I am a very black and white person living in a colorful world.” – Unknown
20. “We’re just trying to find some color in this black and white world.” – Unknown
21. “A natural self-limitation in photography is to leave out the color and present the world in black and white.” – Harold Davis
22. “Most of life is grey, with a little tiny bit of black and white.” – Bill Henson
23. “Color is descriptive. Black and white is interpretive.” – Eliott Erwitt
24. “The outside world is black and white with only one color dead.” – Peter Gabriel
25. “The rest of the world was black and white, but we were in screaming color.” – Taylor Swift
26. “Why black and white? Because color can be too demanding.” – Diane Keaton
27. “The world of superheroes is black and white.” – Donna Langley
28. “I have always liked black and white! It is simple and the colour of the piano.” – Hiromi
29. “I don’t know why we work, my husband and I. We just do. We are black and white – yin and yang.” – Heidi Klum
30. “Black and white has an unsurpassed ability to convey character.” – David Prakel
See also: Instagram Captions: 800+ Most EPIC Quotes For Your Photos
To Conclude
Is everything really black or white in life or there are some shades in between after all?
I hope you got your answer through these inspirational black and white quotes.
Yes, black and white is really the best effect in Photoshop while you’re editing some photographs of nature, landscapes, or even street photography.
But I really hope that you won’t choose to use it in your real life, too.
We all deserve splashes of color in our lives because colors bring happiness.
I do hope that these deep positive quotes above have convinced you of that.
However, there are also many love quotes that will make you think about how much beauty there truly is in black and white.
For so many people, those two colors are enough, and other colors serve to only distract them from the simple beauty in life.
At the end of the day, the world isn’t divided into two sides, black and white, right and wrong.
There are so many shades and tones, so many beautiful things in between, and you’ll miss them all if you keep thinking that way.