Billy Joel Quotes

I remember when I was in art classes, I hated following the assignments. And I would get in trouble for doing something totally different or taking it in a weird direction.

An artist is someone who uses bravery, insight, creativity, and boldness to challenge the status quo. And an artist takes it personally.

I get a kick out of being an outsider constantly. It allows me to be creative.

We love playing music but we're too weird to play music.

I was seen in earlier years by family members and people of authority as somebody wasting his time. I had trouble with the restrictions of conformity. It made me edgy.

Art is maybe a subversive activity. There is a certain rebellion when you are an artist at heart, even if only in the art of living.

I'm American. I'm eclectic. I'm going to follow my musical passions. And if people don't like it, and it hurts my legacy, I'm not going to worry about that.

The only concept or experience or core belief that I can attribute my other-ness to is that I just started out a weirdo and I stayed a weirdo. And it took me a long time to embrace my outsidership and see it as a strength rather than a weakness.

Willie Nelson is the perfect person, it seems to me, to think about. Because something tells me that he operates on his own frequency.

I don't think people are fans of me because I wrote hit songs. I think they're fans because I'm a lunatic or a weirdo. The hit songs came out of my idiosyncratic personality, not the other way around.

I passionately hate the idea of being with it; I think an artist has always to be out of step with his time.

I was more independent than any farmer in Concord, for I was not anchored to a house or farm, but could follow the bent of my genius, which is a very crooked one, every moment.

L.A. is kind of flat these days; I guess Austin and other places are like that now. But that's what I wanted to get across: You could be as crazy as you wanted, and that was OK. You didn't have to be good; people would still come and hear you.

I know that whatever I put out, whether people think it's pop or noise or whatever, it's always going to be some kind of a freak or mutation. It's not going to be anything pure that a lot of people will relate to. And that's fine.

I'm a little insane, and I'm going to be a little different. But hopefully, somewhere in there, in that creative arena, something will emerge that is new and different and unique.

We do things differently. You don't have to worry about being part of a particular genre. You just go for it.

In a moment when criticism shows a singular dearth of direction every man has to be a law unto himself in matters of theatre, writing, and painting. While the American Mercury and the new Ford continue to spread a thin varnish of Ritz over the whole United States there is a certain virtue in being unfashionable.

All art is based on non-conformity.

Try to keep the rebel artist alive in you, no matter how attractive or exhausting the temptation.

I'm certainly not who people think I am. I always do whatever I want to do, and my films are personal to me.

I hope that through my work, artists will take some chances, break some rules, and make art that comes from inside of them. I would like to be remembered as a kind person, a great Mom, and a bit unruly - in a good way!

It has bothered me all my life that I do not paint like everybody else.

It does not matter how badly you paint so long as you don't paint badly like other people.

Poetry is man's rebellion against being what he is.

All the time, I've felt that life is a wager and that I probably was getting more out of leading a bohemian existence as a writer than I would have if I didn't.