Artist Quotes

As far as I am concerned the paint is the person. I want it to work for me just as flesh does

In fact, most artists want to make things a bit more difficult for themselves as they go along, to challenge themselves.

I am personally happy for artists to make as much money as they can while they can to carry them through the times when they can't.

I try to keep my ear to the streets without sacrificing who I am as an artist. If a song needs a drum machine I'll use a drum machine. If it needs a drummer, I'll use a real drummer.

What happen to the pirates we are supposed to see? Then we go down the chutes, and it's where the pirates were. But they're all gone. There is nothing but skeletons down here!

Being an artist, its all a journey, and you learn where the subtle patterns lie.

Raw is a good place for an artist. It's where the truth comes out.

When we are moved by art we are grateful that the artist lived, grateful that he labored in the service of his gifts.

When you're an artist, nobody ever tells you or hits you with the magic wand of legitimacy. You have to hit your own head with your own handmade wand. And you feel stupid doing it.

Your responsibility as an artist is to experiment.

The biggest honor of my career was when I won R&B Artist of the Year back in the 1970s. I look at that as a major honor.

The only compensation for the artist is the chance to feed hungry hearts.

The artist's duty to himself is a combination of immense responsibility and immense irresponsibility. I think those two interlock.

Jay-Z ain't a manager; he owns a management company. He been through this, he been through the game for a long time so he knows tactics in taking artists in certain directions we need to go in.

What an artist is for is to tell us what we see but do not know that we see.

Deadwood was a magical experience. It was an absolute culmination of everything Ive ever wanted to do as an actor as an artist, and I was enormously proud to have been involved with it.

The most popular rap artists aren't supposed to be rapping about being broke.

Now there is fame! Of all - hunger, misery, the incomprehension by the public - fame is by far the worst. It is the castigation of God by the artist. It is sad. It is true.

The same applies to any artist; we are the tools and instruments of our talent. We are outsiders; we have no place in society because society is what we’re watching, and dealing with.

You try not to talk about the past too much as an artist. Instead, you focus on the continuity of your work.

I am not a liberal, not a conservative, not a believer in gradual progress, not a monk. I should like to be a free artist and nothing more.

I honestly don't feel that it's my music that's under-appreciated. I think that it's me that's under-appreciated. As an artist, period.

The less apparent the means and manner of the artist, the more directly will his work appeal to the understanding and the feelings.

You put the right artist on the right track in the studio and leave the door open to let God in.

Memory is a great artist. For every man and for every woman it makes the recollection of his or her life a work of art and an unfaithful record.

I really like working with unique and unknown artists, as they usually bring something fresh to a song.

Charge less, but charge. Otherwise, you will not be taken seriously, and you do your fellow artists no favours if you undercut the market.

The most irritating experience for an artist is to have his work criticized before it is finished.

An artist works through exposed wounds.

I love artists, because through art one can express oneself beautifully.

I refuse the title of artist to those who owe their reputations to a physical deformity. I regard them as buffoons.

Mixed reactions? Sure, I get them all the time. I'm a Marmite artist.

Fine artists deal with finery, but I deal with painful material.

One doesn't need to know the artist's private intentions. The work tells all.

Be non-trend-driven, and explore, be creative and take risks as an artist and as a cultural communicator.

Is there anything more dangerous than sympathetic understanding?

Fear doesn't go away. The warrior and the artist live by the same code of necessity, which dictates that the battle must be fought anew every day.

The artist and the photographer seek the mysteries and the adventure of experience in nature.

What's exciting about being an artist, still, and what I'm really finding is awesome is that you can do it until you drop. I don't care how many lines I have on my face - I'll keep doing it!

When I was a kid, I always thought that I'd be a comic book artist. It took a long time to start thinking that I could be a musician.

Every piece of art is a mirror and serves the function of reflectivity to expose to you and reveal to you more of who you are.

I think an artist's responsibility is more complex than people realize.

Even though I build buildings and I pursue my architecture, I pursue it as an artist. I deliberately keep a tiny studio. I don't want to be an architectural firm. I want to remain an artist.

It is only after years of preparation that the young artist should touch color - not color used descriptively, that is, but as a means of personal expression.

I think it's the pain and suffering that drive you to become an artist. The art itself should be the pain, sort of exorcising every demon and making you feel like you're a person that matters.

The artist alone sees spirits. But after he has told of their appearing to him, everybody sees them.

If you feel that strongly about something, you have an obligation to try and change my mind.

I am here to enjoy life. I am not here to suffer. I am here to be a dreamer, to be an artist, to be a seer. The mission of my life is to enjoy every single moment of my life.

The more perfect the artist, the more completely separate in him will be the man who suffers and the mind which creates.

People don't remember each tree in a park but all of us benefit from the trees. And in a way, artists are like trees in a park.