Edgar Degas: "Art is not what..."

"Art is not what you see, but what you make others see."

—Edgar Degas

Lou Volpe: "I had to learn balance..."

"I had to learn balance, harmony, order, design, composition. I had to learn that all good theater is a process and you must go through it totally or an element will be missed somewhere, and the end result will be nothing more than mediocre."

-Lou Volpe, from Michael Sokolove's Drama High

Constantin Stanislavski: "Love art in yourself..."

"Love art in yourself, not yourself in art."

–Constantin Stanislavski, My Life in Art
 

John Adams: "I must study..."

"I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce, and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music..."

Neil Gaiman: "Go and make interesting mistakes..."

"Go and make interesting mistakes. Make amazing mistakes. Make glorious and fantastic mistakes. Break rules. Leave the world more interesting for your being here. Make Good Art."

–Neil Gaiman's commencement speech on the life of an artist

Neil Gaiman: "If you have an idea..."

"If you have an idea of what you want to make, what you were put here to do, then just go do that. And that's much harder than it sounds. And sometimes in the end so much easier than you might imagine... "

–Neil Gaiman's commencement speech on the life of an artist

Neil Gaiman: "A freelance life..."

"A freelance life, a life in the arts, is sometimes like putting messages in bottles on a desert island and hoping that someone will find one of your bottles and open it and read it and put something in a bottle that will wash its way back to you. Appreciation, or a commission, or money, or love. And you have to accept that you may put out hundreds of things for every bottle that winds up coming back."

–Neil Gaiman's commencement speech on the life of an artist

Neil Gaiman: "Make your art..."

"Make your art. Do the stuff that only you can do... The moment that you feel that, just possibly, you're walking down the street naked, exposing too much of your heart and your mind and what exists on the inside, showing too much of yourself, that's the moment you may be starting to get it right."


–Neil Gaiman's commencement speech on the life of an artist

Neil Gaiman: "Make Good Art..."

"Remember, whatever discipline you're in... you have one thing that's unique: you have the ability to make art. And for me, that's been a lifesaver... When things get tough this is what you should do: Make Good Art. Do what only you can do best: Make Good Art."

–Neil Gaiman's commencement speech on the life of an artist

Kurt Vonnegut: "Go into the arts..."

"Go into the arts. I'm not kidding. The arts are not a way to make a living. They are a very human way of making life more bearable. Practicing an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow, for heaven's sake. Sing in the shower. Dance to the radio. Tell stories. Write a poem to a friend, even a lousy poem. Do it as well as you possibly can. You will get an enormous reward. You will have created something."

–Kurt Vonnegut, novelist/essayist/artist

Hart & Kaufman: "Art is only achieved..."

"Art is only achieved through perspiration... but it helps if you've got a little talent with it."

–Moss Hart & George S. Kaufman, You Can't Take It With You (Kolenkhov & Grandpa)

Edgar Degas: "Art is not what..."

"Art is not what you see, but what you make others see."

—Edgar Degas

Jean Dubuffet: "Art does not lie down..."

"Art does not lie down on the bed that is made for it; it runs away as soon as one says its name; it loves to be incognito. Its best moments are when it forgets what it is called."

--Jean Dubuffet, French painter

Larry and Andy Wachowski: "Art is created by..."

"Art is created by individuals and there are no individuals in a world where you are told what to think."

—Larry and Andy Wachowski, V in "V for Vendetta"

Larry and Andy Wachowski: "Artists use lies to..."

"Artists use lies to tell the truth, while politicians use them to cover the truth up."

—Larry and Andy Wachowski, Evey in "V for Vendetta"

Mary Carole McCauley: "Art isn't meant to..."

"Art isn't meant to be protected like a hothouse flower from the withering blasts of real life. Theater isn't created in spite of the rude, bruising outside world — it springs from it. It is the source of the art form's vitality, its ferocity and its relevance."

- Mary Carole McCauley, The Baltimore Sun, May 1, 2010

Ernst Fischer: "In a decaying society..."

"In a decaying society, art, if it is truthful, must also reflect decay. And unless it wants to break faith with its social function, art must show the world as changeable. And help to change it."

—Ernst Fischer

Patrick Pacheco: "Until that twelfth of..."

"Until that twelfth of never, what the world does have is art. Art that says, as it does in this musical, that 'In the middle of your life anything can happen.' Art that says that love is the greatest journey that heaven can allow. Art that says that while the pain of loss is ineffable and unending, the beauty of music can give voice to that pain and even redeem it."

- Patrick Pacheco, in the liner notes of the DEATH TAKES A HOLIDAY cast album

Unknown: "All life is art..."

"All life is trying to be art.
And all art is trying to be music."

—Unknown