Gus Van Sant Quotes

Sometimes it's bad to do something you've never done before.

If you want to do something different, you're going to come up against a lot of naysayers.

Why not upset the apple cart? If you don't, the apples will rot anyway.

You have to be willing to offend in order to make progress.

If you are not willing to risk the unusual, you will have to settle for the ordinary.

Don't let what you don't know scare you, because it can become your greatest asset. And if you do things without knowing how they have always been done, you're guaranteed to do them differently.

I feel every day that everything I create - everything I do - I want it to be a risk. I think when you take the big swings - and I've done plenty of big swings that I was told were never going to work - those are always the things that break through.

Mindless habitual behavior is the enemy of innovation.

You know that I'm always a proponent of doing things differently.

Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties.

Let me just say this - sometimes being a trailblazer is highly overrated.

If you're not failing every now and again, it's a sign you're not doing anything very innovative.

Probable impossibilities are to be preferred to improbable possibilities.

I believe you have to be willing to be misunderstood if you're going to innovate.

Wherever I see people doing something the way it's always been done, the way it's 'supposed' to be done, following the same old trends, well, that's just a big red flag to me to go look somewhere else.

If you're not doing something different, you're not doing anything.

All I know is, I'm trying to do things that are a little different whenever I can.

I think when you take the big swings - and I've done plenty of big swings that I was told were never going to work - those are always the things that break through.

Once people feel comfortable with something, they say, 'Let's try it.'

Familiarity is all the rage. And if you're doing something that doesn't have its rhythms preset, you know, everybody's a little bit uncomfortable.

If doing anything new, you're very used to having insurmountable obstacles.

New ideas that fly in the face of conventional wisdom of the day are always greeted with doubt and scorn, even fear.

If you don't take a risk then what's the point. We can't keep making films in the same space.

I see things differently: you need to take risks in life.

I don't want to play safe, because there are a lot of people who are playing it safe, and I don't want to be one of them.