Laurie Simmons Quotes

I think perhaps I've learned to be myself. I have a theory that all artists who would be important - painters and writers - must learn to be themselves. It takes a very long time.

I feel, as an artist, I should be able to express who I am and the things I come from, and the places I want to also be.

Singing and acting suit me. I made a vow to myself to do everything that I can do with this life that I have, and I have to find the time to do this. Sometimes I need to be an actress. Sometimes I don't need to be Jill. However, everyone is always looking for the Jill in everything.

Being an artist means ceasing to take seriously that very serious person we are when we are not an artist.

If people want to know who I am, it is all in the work.

At the typewriter you find out who you are.

Don't worry if people think you're good. Make this your experience. And find out what makes you unique as an artist. You don't get the opportunity to do that as much in the real world.

You are the artist and the art.

I've really come into my own as an artist. I'm much more sure of my identity and understand it much better, and have accepted the fact that I like to jump around a lot in terms of who I am and what kind of music I create, and that it is okay - in fact, that is my main identity, the fact that I do that.

I'd like to walk that fine line between the authentic artist self and the manufactured artist self. I'd like to exist outside of a set of expectations or assumptions about what the Kehinde Wiley brand is. And I'd like to walk towards something that's a bit more unpredictable, human.

'Birdman' came from a very beautiful side of me, from a part of honesty and surrender about things.

I feel like it's important, especially at young age, to find exactly what it is that makes your style so important as opposed to just trying to fit into the iconic styles of performers out there.

He has found his style, when he cannot do otherwise.

I actually was rebelling as all young adults tend to do at or around the age of 19, to experiment with their lives and have fun.

I guess I had a suspicion of it my entire life without knowing exactly what it was - knowing that there was something different about me, which I attributed to being an artist. At 11 or 12 I started sort of clarifying for myself. It took a while.

I've always been interested in how fast-moving our identity is and that I've never been able to pin down who I truly am. That inspires me to write, because I feel like that cements me a bit, in that I find my identity in being an artist.

My writing was liberated once I abandoned acting.

I went to art school, I think it helped me a great deal because it taught me who I am.

I couldn't be 'Johnny' in front of a camera in acting jobs and behind the camera I like to be 'Michael.' With directing, you can't do it by halves. There's a lot of reflection, and I have found that I, as 'Michael,' thrive on it. It's lovely coming home and feeling that stuff from a day's work as myself.

Part of the very impulse of writing for me is actually wanting to get away from myself.

L.A. is so isolated and unhip in a way; it gives you room to figure out who you are and explore more personal stuff.

France was very opposite of the show-business experience I'd been living; I was anonymous and alone. I wore no makeup, wore the same clothes every day. And I wrote and wrote and wrote.

The reason I put make-up on or wear the costume is to try and find my own style. It's like my guitar style - I'm just trying to be an original artist.

My shadow in my art is one way I trace who I was and where I have been. My shadow and I have been on a journey for quite a while now!