Agnes de Mille Quotes

I was always interested in choreography - in making people think and feel something.

The body is your instrument in dance, but your art is outside that creature, the body.

I like to choreograph and create and design the costumes and do it all and then step back and watch it and then move on to the next project.

The first time I started choreographing was in the dark, in my living room, with the lights completely out, to some popular music on the radio. I put the radio on full blast and I started moving. I didn't know what it looked like. I didn't want to see it... I had to start in the dark.

I am absorbed in the magic of movement and light. Movement never lies. It is the magic of what I call the outer space of the imagination.

I watched 'Fame,' and I just love the choreography. It just gives me a place to be in another zone.

Creating is a lonely thing in a lot of ways.

The real message of the Dance opens up the vistas of life to all who have the urge to express beauty with no other instrument than their own bodies, with no apparatus and no dependence on anything other than space.

Choreography and creativity - it's my matrix; let's see where we can move.

My own physicality, not an abstract idea, makes me a choreographer.

Dancers are a work of art - they are the canvas on which their work is painted.

All of the vintage photos of Ballets Russes are so inspiring.

My first idea of movement, of the dance, certainly came from the rhythm of the wave.

Making dances is an act of progress; it is an act of growth, an act of music, an act of teaching, an act of celebration, an act of joy.

I have such a respect and fascination for dance. I can be light as air or stay grounded. Dance is really another universe.

I think Balanchine and Robbins talk to God and when I call, he's out to lunch.

Creativity has nothing to do with any activity in particular - with painting, poetry, dancing, singing. It has nothing to do with anything in particular.

As much as I love performing, nothing juices me up creatively like being in my own studio for an extended period. Songs, ideas, even paintings are pouring out of me. My inspiration and usual subject matter: life.

Originality is the only thing that counts. But the originator uses material and ideas that occur round him and pass through him. And out of his experience comes the original creation.

My creative process involves reading books and magazines, writing outside, and moving around a lot. I like to pace around when I'm writing songs.

Dancing is being trusted with other people's guts; choreographing is trusting other people with yours. When I choreograph I'm giving a dancer something to do and trusting the dancer to do it and build on it.

A word is a bud attempting to become a twig. How can one not dream while writing? It is the pen which dreams. The blank page gives the right to dream.

When I discovered dancing, I learned to dream.

Your creativity before it gets formed into words and songs is the actual substance. No one else can see it, right? Unless you give it the shape of a song or a painting or whatever.

My body was so instrumental to how I took pictures: it was practically a dance. I used to use my legs a lot; now I'm a little more sedentary.