Billy Corgan Quotes

The public so often want to freeze the artist in a moment in time when they were at their peak, and they want the artist to revisit it over and over again as if it was something authentic.

Most artists have retired too absolutely; they grow rusty, inflexible to the flow of currents.

If a man ain't nothin' else, then he's an artist. It's the only thing he can claim to be that nobody can prove he ain't.

I'm a sponge, the more I absorb, the more I am able to articulate my vision, as artists do, like Picasso. I'm an artist in that light. I went from being an artist to an artiste.

If I had a musical identity that was definable then it would be time to get into painting or something else. Race car driving.

A lot of people thought I got famous as a studio artist, then decided to cash in on it. But it actually was just a matter of survival for many years, and I felt it was really important for me to be able to say whatever I wanted with my street art and fine art.

An artist is the only thing I want to be. I only want my freedom and my creativity. It's all that I live for. I reject the idea that I have to take all the costumes and makeup off to be f - king authentic.

For an artist, to be normal is a disaster

Artists who approach perfection do not have many ideas.

I had a visit from an artist friend who basically said, "Your paintings are wonderful. Now stop." It did resonate with me. It hit on the percolating need for change that was already there. I got a little push. I did a group of the paintings early on that were among the best. It was sort of beginner's luck with these.

Artists should never look at pictures, but should stutter in a language of their own.

All artists, they say, are a little mad. This madness is, to a certain extent, a self-created myth designed to keep the generality away from the phenomenally close-knit creative community. Yet, in the world of the artists, the consciously eccentric are always respectful and admiring if those who have the courage to be genuinely a little mad.

The only happy artist is a dead artist, because only then you can't change. After I die, I'll probably come back as a paintbrush.

I'm not an industry artist - I'm an artist in the industry.

It is precisely those artists and writers who are most inclined to think of their art as the manifestation of their personality who are in fact the most in bondage to public taste.

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.

Me being able to be acting and doing other things has opened me as an artist, and I think even more from a visual standpoint.

K. Dot was a kid who was trying to find himself in music, finding trends, um, bending towards - ready to bend towards what the industry was telling me to do and after you mature at a certain time in your life, you come into your own...your own niche, your own personality, not only as an artist but as a person.

I'm an artist and you can fantasize about me however you want.

I have a life and do a lot of things, and so far my work has been my life. If I was a painter no one would question me about my age. I'm an artist, I hate saying that.

All you can do as an artist is do what you think is an extension of you. You put down on paper ... who you are. That's what being an artist is all about. And when it gets done, you don't look back at it and say, Oh, I could have done that better.

Everybody's an artist. Unfortunately we don't treat them as such.

When the individuality of the artist begins to express itself, what the artist gains in the way of liberty he loses in the way of order.

I am the same artist with the same nagging questions I had in my early 20's. What's real and what isn't? How do we tell what's real in our lives? How do we see things as they are? What is my role in life? If the Signature hadn't forced the issue by devoting its season to my plays, I could at least believe I had changed. Really, they're all the same! What is SIX DEGREES OF SEPARATION but THE HOUSE OF BLUE LEAVES with money?

Being an artist is a totally godlike thing to do - and I have a god complex.