Athol Fugard Quotes

I always say I want creative control. A lot of people don't think about that. And that's what every artist should think of - being creative and not just a puppet.

If we pretend to respect the artist at all we must allow him his freedom of choice , in the face, in particular cases, of innumerable presumptions that the choice will not fructify.

An artist should write for himself & not for an audience. If the audience likes it, great. If not, they can keep away.

It may be said that artist and censor differ in this wise: that the first is a decent mind in an indecent body and that the second is an indecent mind in a decent body.

Art must not serve might.

Art has nothing to do with politics. It is the freest thing in the world.

I don't feel that as an artist my job is to offer PR propaganda, whether for the good or for the bad.

The artist is not responsible to any one. His social role is asocial... his only responsibility consists in an attitude to the work he does.

I make movies for me and posterity. I'm more scared of history than I am of the studio.

I don't think that artists of any kind would or could sacrifice their artistic freedom by being more responsible with their influence on people, especially young people.

I will not have the Federal Theater used politically.

I think, like any artist or any writer, I just want to have that pure freedom of expression and of thought - the freedom to explore and move in unexpected ways.

We need to give artists a lot of free room to create.

I don't believe in censorship, but I do believe that an artist has to take some moral responsibility for what he or she is putting out there.

When I did TV shows and my other movies, I never try to do it for anybody. I just do what I think is good no matter what the genre is.

My greatest accomplishment is the freedom for doing what I want to do with my music...I love my freedom so I'm happy I am a free artist.

There's such a freedom about being an artist... You're not accountable - you're this renegade thing.

We as artists cannot be politicians. We as artists can only be truth-tellers.

The only way artists can do things is to do it for themselves. Trying to second guess what the public wants or likes is kind of a fool's game.

You know, I'm incredibly blessed to be able to have this level of choice as an artist today. In this economy, it's something that I, you know, pinch myself at constantly, just thinking about how I could wake up tomorrow and decide I'm going to start painting this or that. So it's good.

I don't think music can be held. I don't think artists can be put into boxes or places. It's all about creating and making the best music you can.

I practice the artist's golden rule. I wouldn't want somebody telling me how to finish my painting, I'm not going to tell him how to finish his movie or how to shape his movie.

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.

I never pigeonholed myself - the only reason you'd want to pigeonhole is to monetize your business and, as a person, I don't see the importance of doing that. My music took off above the rest of those things: You can just make a song, put it on a CD, and get it out to all these people.

I think, for some artists, the fear of taking on a political identity stems from not wanting to be pigeonholed as political actor or a political musician. It becomes this thing where somehow your art can no longer exist on its own and be multifaceted.