Artist quotes
8.6K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
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"Unless I am both capable of and willing to reopen the wound every time I write a song, if I choose to not look inside myself to write music, I'm really not worth being called an artist at all."
"Knowing that I inspired SAM SMITH is one of the most powerful experiences I've had as an artist. I was Sam. I still am Sam."
"Well, in order for me to be successful... In order to be a great artist - musician, actor, painter, whatever - you must be able to be private in public at all times."
"My work as an artist is completely separate from my work as a philanthropist."
"I'm supposed to be, I am an artist. Yes, I'm lonely. But I'm married to my loneliness."
"The only thing that I am concerned with in life is being an artist .. I had to suppress for so many years in high school because I was made fun of but now I'm completely insulated in my box of insanity and I can do whatever I like."
"I'm not interested in people positioning me next to other artists."
"I realized that it's my own fault that people take advantage of me. I should be around people who cherish my talents, my health, my time. I'm not a pawn for anyone's future business. I'm an artist. I deserve better than to be loyal to people who only believe in me because I make money."
"The creatives, they want to connect with people. These artists, the clothing designers, they want to connect with people the same way that music gets to connect with people. But the cost of silk is too expensive. And they won't lower their quality levels. So I can spend $2 million on a record and give it out in a democratic way. They could spend all their time making the greatest dress in the world, and it's just impossible to hand-make that many."
"A lot of artists have a lot of different ventures, I think it's typical for a hip hop artist, at this point, to have a bunch of different ventures."
"I am a pop artist, so my medium is public opinion and the world is my canvas."
"If I was just a fan of music, I would think that I was the number one artist in the world."
"I'm the No. 1 artist in the world right now ... I am the No. 1 human being in music."
"I've been connected to the most culturally important albums of the past four years, the most influential artists of the past ten years. You have like, Steve Jobs, Walt Disney, Henry Ford, Howard Hughes, Nicolas Ghesquière, Anna Wintour, David Stern."
"However contradictory the coroner's report — whether he pronounces Consumption or Loneliness or Suicide to be the cause of death — isn't it plain how the true artist-seer actually dies? I say that the true artist-seer, the heavenly fool who can and does produce beauty, is mainly dazzled to death by his own scruples, the blinding shapes and colors of his own sacred human conscience."
"As nearly as possible in the spirit of Matthew Salinger, age one, urging a luncheon companion to accept a cool lima bean, I urge my editor, mentor and (heaven help him) closest friend, William Shawn, genius domus of The New Yorker, lover of the long shot, protector of the unprolific, defender of the hopelessly flamboyant, most unreasonably modest of born great artist-editors to accept this pretty skimpy-looking book."
"I suspect that money is a far greater distraction for the artist than hunger."
"You have, let us say, a promising politician, a rising artist that you wish to destroy. Dagger or bomb are archaic, clumsy and unreliable - but teach him, inoculate him with chess."
"There are many readers of the book, who don't know anything about the authors and the artists. There is more than one author. It doesn't matter, if you can't make the reader dive into the story and surround him with that environment and those characters. That's an experience that lasts longer than figuring out who did what. I think that's what makes our working relationship better, it helps us to make a book that feels unique and not like different voices."
"My goal as an artist is to always be true to who I am and give my fans music they will enjoy for a lifetime"
