Jenny Holzer Quotes

Isolation is a big part of songwriting.

An artist is always alone - if he is an artist. No, what the artist needs is loneliness.

The only thing that makes one an artist is making art. And that requires the precise opposite of hanging out; a deeply lonely and unglamorous task of tolerating oneself long enough to push something out.

I think to be writer you have to enjoy being alone. I was a loner as a teenager and was always drawn to characters in books and films who were at the fringes.

The writer works in a lonely way.

Some degree of withdrawal serves to nurture man's creative powers. The artist and the scientist bring out of the dark void, like the mysterious universe itself, the unique, the strange, the unexpected. Numerous observers have testified upon the loneliness of the process.

You have to remember that writing itself is so solitary. You start writing because you're lonely.

Writing is the lonely sport of sad sacks.

I do love writing but it is a lonely profession. You're lonely and optimistic at the same time.

If an artist wants to use his mind for creative work, cutting oneself off from society is a necessary thing

Writing is a solitary occupation, and one of its hazards is loneliness. But an advantage of loneliness is privacy, autonomy and freedom.

When I'm writing solitude feels very good. But when I'm not writing it feels lonely... Having a big family solves that problem.

You have to really have a taste for being alone to be a writer.

Very few people can write in a crowd. This is a very solitary occupation. I have known people more talented than me who never made it. And the primary reason was always that they couldn't stand to be alone for several hours a day. Any writer worth anything has mastered the art. The art of solitude.

All writing is an antisocial act, since the writer is a man who can speak freely only when alone; to be himself he must lock himself up, to communicate he must cut himself off from all communication; and in this there is something always a little mad.

The primary distinction of the artist is that he must actively cultivate that state which most men, necessarily, must avoid; the state of being alone.

You know you lose a lot of social skills if you're a writer. You spend too long alone. And its forced me to address that.

I suffer depression only in the sense that I am a writer. We don't have proper jobs to go to. We are on our own all day. Show me a writer who doesn't get depressed: who has a completely stable mood. They'd be a garage mechanic or something.

Writing is a lonely business.

Every human is an artist. The dream of your life is to make beautiful art.

I paint self-portraits because I am so often alone, because I am the person I know best.

The only thing in life that really gives me any peace is just being lost in the process of creating something, whether it's the film or painting and drawing, which has been a big part of my life, for a long time.

I've led a very isolated existence since I was 6 years old. It's kind of been me and my mind.

The time you feel lonely is the time you most need to be by yourself.

I like to go into a little shell and be a hermit and make music for a while.