Marina Abramovic Quotes

Sensation is an element of what I do, and why not? It's not sensational for the sake of being sensational, but it's sensational art... It's like touching skin.

I have always believed that an artiste needs to respond to a story first. One has to feel it in order to live it.

I think myself that, rather like books, music is meant to enter into the brain, well via your ears rather than your eyes but, it's - I think a lot more should be left to the imagination.

I think subjectivity plays into everything. It's unavoidable; you couldn't avoid it if you tried. I think, potentially, a lot more commercial movies, it seems to be that the people making the films are trying to elicit the same reaction. I think a lot of the most interesting work in art and in films are often kind of polarized opinions and affect people in very different ways, which may be less successful commercially, but they elicit a dialogue that's quite interesting.

People will say things after a screening that it affects them in a certain way, which is why I don't like to explain what certain things are about. I want them to have that. It limits people's ability to understand something if I say it's "about this." That's happened to us a bunch on this.

Music falls on the silence like a sense / A passion that we feel, not understand.

I am almost equal to a shadow.

It probably does make it more difficult to enjoy a good laugh at someone who's onstage, seemingly yelling at you. But I'm not yelling at the audience, I'm yelling at the world. It genuinely sucks if people are taking it that way. But I'm not talking to individuals.

The great end of all arts is to make an impression on the imagination and the feeling. The imitation of nature frequently does this. Sometimes it fails and something else succeeds.

As Spectator I wanted to explore photography not as a question (a theme) but as a wound.

I think that music is still a mystery to most people. It kind of goes through most people without a specific thought. They feel the music, which is what's supposed to happen. They're not supposed to be curious about who wrote the music; they're supposed to feel what the show is trying to get them to feel. So if I help get that feeling across, that's good enough for me.

It is ironic but true: the one reality science cannot reduce is the only reality we will ever know. This is why we need art. By expressing our actual experience, the artist reminds us that our science is incomplete, that no map of matter will ever explain the immateriality of our consciousness.

The purpose of all art is to cause a deep and emotion, also one that is entertaining or pleasing. Out of the depth and entertainment comes value.

This is a book about Heaven. I know it now. It floats among us like a cloud and is the realest thing we know and the least to be captured, the least to be possessed by anybody for himself. It is like a grain of mustard seed, which you cannot see among the crumbs of earth where it lies. It is like the reflection of the trees on the water.

As regards my means of expression, I try my hardest to achieve the maximum of clarity, power, and plastic aggressiveness; a physical sensation to begin with, followed up by an impact on the psyche.

The Dancer believes that his art has something to say which cannot be expressed in words or in any other way than by dancing... there are times when the simple dignity of movement can fulfill the function of a volume of words. There are movements which impinge upon the nerves with a strength that is incomparable, for movement has power to stir the senses and emotions, unique in itself. This is the dancer's justification for being, and his reason for searching further for deeper aspects of his art.

Everyone's taste is different. But I think the best way to defend against regrets after opening night is to try your best to tell the story you want to tell. In terms of smaller changes over time, I think good plays are like poems. Every syllable counts.

Actors are always going to have a little bit of themselves in everything.

The aim of literature ... is the creation of a strange object covered with fur which breaks your heart.

To be an actor or actress, you have to feel on a deep level and tap into emotions that you've never felt before. You're imagining how something would feel. You have to use your imagination so much.

There is a wonderful expression: seeing through a glass darkly. Everything, even life, is inevitably removed from you. You can't reach, or touch, the real. You just see reflections

Art disturbs, science reassures.

It is, as Mr. Rokesmith says, a matter of feeling, but Lor how many matters ARE matters of feeling!

Reading something for the first time and getting this feeling like the material provokes you on some level, and doing the movie is really just sort of defining and figuring out why exactly you felt certain things when you read it.