Jonathan Safran Foer Quotes

Don't make music for some vast, unseen audience or market or ratings share or even for something as tangible as money. Though it's crucial to make a living, that shouldn't be your inspiration. Do it for yourself.

Art for art's sake, and creation for creation's sake, and love for love's sake

I'm not living for when I have a Number One record or when I make a million trillion dollars. I'm not doing this to get somewhere else. I'm doing it because I'm doing it.'

If people would like to come to my concerts I'd love them to come. And if they like the music that I make, I love that too. But I do not make music for other people. I make it to please myself.

You create content because you love it, not necessarily because you're looking for fame or know what it will potentially lead to.

Everything I do creatively is never for money.

It's not always about huge giant commercial success. It's about art.

Writing is its own reward.

I just want to produce and create projects that I'm passionate about and I love.

True artists are almost the only men who do their work for pleasure.

Set me a task in which I can put something of my very self, and it is a task no longer; it is joy; it is art.

Acting should be an end in itself.

Satisfying myself is the point in filmmaking, in my mind.

Doing beautiful things is its own reward.

I didn't start making music in order to be famous.

The deeper I get into my life as a musician, I'm discovering that it becomes less and less about other people, and more about what I want to do. And that's a good place to be.

I've hit a point where my big luxury is getting to work on the things I want to work on. That's my hobby. It's being able to do a movie like 'Chef,' where you don't get paid, where you get paid scale, but you get to do exactly the movie you want to do. To me, that's worth more to me than whatever money I would have gotten paid.

I will always want to do whatever it is that my heart is in, and whether I get paid for it or not means nothing. It doesn't matter. I'll do it if it means something to me and I want to be a part of it.

I'm confident in my intentions and why I'm making music. I'm not making music because I want to be on your TV screen or the cover of your magazine.

Fame was never something I was seeking in my artistic journey. It's to be used as a tool for an artist to break open doors and keep creating. That's how I enjoyed fame in '74; it was not just for the emptiness of being famous.

I'll always take an artistic endeavor over a career move.

No book that is written for an external purpose is going to be a passionately felt book for the writer or the reader. I don't see the point in doing that.

I am interested in art as a means of living a life; not as a means of making a living.

You may be basing a portion of your self-worth on your bank account without even realizing it. Try to pinpoint the activities and qualities that, free of charge, fulfill you.

I don't need the money, dear. I work for art.