George Grosz Quotes

As an artist, what you do is you put out material constantly. Whether it's films, or TV shows, music... and you know, you hope people respond to it. You always have to know, as well, that not everybody's gonna like it. And that's okay. It's not for everyone. It's just for the crusty nugs.

I think it's harder to make a classic now, not because of what people say, but because artists now are so concerned with what people say.

To be an artist is a blessing and a privilege. Artists must never betray their true hearts. Artists must look beneath the surface and show that there is more to this world than what meets the eye.

I've learned a lot about the limits of what I can do, as an artist, or what I'm willing to do. It's a lot of responsibility to carry a show and to speak to people on different levels.

An artist is generally expected to stick to one motif, one persona. People get used to seeing someone put down a certain thing.

In art there are only two types of people: revolutionaries and plagiarists

People say we're similar with Lady Gaga, that we both mix all these things in the pot and spit them out differently, but she spits it out exactly the same! None of her music's reflective of how weird she wants to be or thinks she is. She models herself on Grace Jones and Madonna, but the music sounds like 20-year-old Ibiza music, you know? She's not progressive, but she's a good mimic.

Nothing can come out of an artist that is not in the man.

Being an artist is this kind of occupation in which you have to make people care about your obsession.

We're creators by permission, by grace as it were. No one creates alone, of and by himself. An artist is an instrument that registers something already existent, something which belongs to the whole world, and which, if he is an artist, he is compelled to give back to the world.

The man who reacts to the universe with a cry of impotent anguish is acceptable as an artist only if he can persuade us that he has sanely considered the other possible reactions and found them inadequate.

Hopefully this is going to be a trend, the beginning of a movement to reclaim theater for the artist and not commerce. I think there's a level of fatigue. Artists are tired of having to create work that's then coopted by commercial demands. When you begin souping up the car, the car no longer feels like your own.

Artists are all giving so much of ourselves to the work and the people and the press and the media and Twitter and all that now. For me, being able to create from a genuine place is really difficult lately because there's so much going on all the time, but when all that stuff gets quiet, you can explore your ideas without any ego or mental chatter.

The romantic artist expects people to ask, 'What has he got to say?' The classical artist expects them to ask, 'How does he say it?

We as visual artists need to continue to be renegades and say, "Yes I am here to do a project, but what is the social service?"

The classical artist can be recognized by his sincerity, the romantic by his laborious insincerity.

I've always been inspired by female performers and artists who really surround who they are around their voice. For me, it's always been about the voice. I wanna hear someone just sit by a piano, on a stool, and just sing - and that's it!

But an artist, he realized. Or rather so-called artist. Bohemian. That's closer to it. The artistic life without the talent.

The artist is the lowest form of life on the rung of the ladder. The publishers are usually businessmen who deal with businessmen. They deal with promotional people. They deal with financial people. They deal with accountants. They deal with people who work on higher levels. They deal with tax people, but have absolutely no interest in artists, in individual artists, especially very young artists.

There's a perception that if an artist produces another artist, they're going to imprint on them. But I'm the opposite. I want to hear that artist; I don't want to hear me - that's the last thing I want to hear. There are a lot of technical studio things I've learned or figured out, and I feel like I could use those things to help other people with what they're doing.

The digital world has allowed me a connection with my reader that I'd never had before. I didn't meet the people who read my material. The fan letters were mostly answered by professional people that'd done them for a living. And I didn't have any daily connection with their response to my work. I didn't have a relationship with my audience. And every artist should have it.

This is the thing: Art is more important than making a show, something that amuses people. Art is something that needs to give to the public, to the actors, to the artist - to give something that makes life the paradise it can be. Life can be a paradise. Still, I believe that. Even if there is Trump, there can be a paradise.

I care deeply about anyone who listens to my music. That's a sacred connection between the artist and the person who appreciates what you do - it's beyond words how meaningful that is. But I'm not going to stifle myself from trying new things because I feel like people that are already into my stuff might not like it.

All serious art is being destroyed by commerce. Most people don't want art to be disturbing. They want it to be escapist. I don't think art should be escapist. That's a waste of time.

I take making music seriously, but you have to have a sense of humor about yourself. I invite people into my life. That's how I do it.