Igor Stravinsky Quotes

The more constraints one imposes, the more one frees one's self. And the arbitrariness of the constraint serves only to obtain precision of execution.

If you have rules, you let creativity sleep.

I believe that creativity comes from compromise. If you could have everything you ever wanted, it doesn't always work.

There is no privilege in restriction. In other words, I disagree with people who say restriction makes you more creative. I think that's a misleading slogan. I might have been more creative without them than with them.

They say that structure is freedom, and in a sense it is. When you're dealing with multiple constraints, you have to figure out what you can get out of that.

You don't need a framework. You need a painting, not a frame.

I see myself as someone who makes things. Definitions have never done anything but constrain.

I think the idea of art kills creativity.

You're always in a box, and you're an escape artist if you do what I do - or if you're a creative person, period. You build your box, and then you escape from it. You build another one, and you escape from it. That's ongoing.

We wanted the freedom to be playful, to experiment and do what we felt like doing, but we were heavily affected by the success that the first record gave us.

Having no choice doesn't result in innovation and performance improvement.

Some rules are there for a reason - but it's one thing to have a rule that protects and another to have rules that stifle.

Art chooses its constraints.

I just like being creative, whatever way I have to do it.

I just wanted to make something in the world and worry about the rest of it later and not get too caught up in rules.

Form is burden. Sometimes being part of the system enslaves the mind and greatly limits the imagination by enslaving it to form. Form is a burden to the mind that sees no limits. Form is a prison for the soul who sees possibilities outside the lines and wishes to test them.

I will not allow anyone to take anything off my palette but if I do then within that, I can be creative.

Limitations can be hugely creative and hugely inspiring - so long as they are the ones you choose for yourself.

Form is a straitjacket in the way that a straitjacket was a straitjacket for Houdini.

It is the limitation of means that determines style, gives rise to new forms and makes creativity possible.

Don't be a prisoner of your own style!

Everybody who works under any system feels confined. It is a natural reaction. You are confined to a certain extent. You are confined if you work in a bank, if you paint. You are confined, in a sense, to your art - the enclosure of your mind. Everybody should break out.

You know the worst thing is freedom. Freedom of any kind is the worst for creativity. You know, Dali spent two months in jail in Spain, and these two months were the most enjoyable and happy in my life. Before my jail period, I was always nervous, anxious. I didn't know if I should make a drawing, or perhaps make a poem, or go to the movies or the theatre, or catch a girl, or play with the boys. The people put me in jail, and my life became divine. Tremendous!

Style is the outcome of constraint.

Start with a style and you are in chains, start with an idea and you are free.