Gavin Creel Quotes

Art is not a mirror to reflect the world, but a hammer with which to shape it

The power and reach of music should never be underestimated.

I love that theatre can be political. You can go watch a play; it sends out messages, and you can go away thinking differently to the way you thought about it before.

Now, I don't know whether a film can change the world, but I know that it starts - I know the power of it - I know that it starts people thinking about how to change the world.

I think music has the power to transform people, and in doing so, it has the power to transform situations - some large and some small.

Actors are agents of change. A film, a piece of theater, a piece of music, or a book can make a difference. It can change the world.

I may be alone in this, but I do sense the power of film, in that movies have the ability to literally change people's minds. That's pretty powerful stuff when you consider that.

I believe in the sacred mission of art to change history.

Art, it is said, is not a mirror, but a hammer: it does not reflect, it shapes.

Nothing changes in the world because of cinema.

As you grow older you realize that art has an enormous effect. It's frightening sometimes to think of the effect that we can have.

The artist has tremendous power to change the world.

Musicians have the power to influence people and along with movie makers, they can reach and influence more people than any group of people, more than scientists and certainly more than politicians.

It is the artists of the world, the feelers and the thinkers who will ultimately save us; who can articulate, educate, defy, insist, sing and shout the big dreams.

I had always been affected by films, as well, of course - and great films.

You were born with the power to change others. You change people by the way you treat them. That is what changes the human heart.

Architecture and any art can transform a person, even save someone. It can for children - for anyone. It still does for me.

My parents never mentioned anything about fashion in our household, instead we used to talk about literature, theatre, and arts...this is why I have kept a real relation with the Art world, by putting books from the beginning in my shops' windows.

Artists... disappeared long ago as social forces. So did the church.

The arts can bring the heart to the aid of the head, the personal to the political.

What most of us must be involved in--whether we teach or write, make films, write films, direct films, play music, act, whatever we do--has to not only make people feel good and inspired and at one with other people around them, but also has to educate a new generation to do this very modest thing: change the world.

There was no special event that made me decide. I had collected some photos and the idea was in the back of my mind for a long time. It was growing and growing, so finally I said, 'I must paint this.' I come from East Germany and am not a Marxist, so of course at the time I had no sympathy for the ideas, or for the ideology that these people represented. I couldn't understand, but I was still impressed. Like everyone, I was touched. It was an exceptional moment for Germany.

Music has given a voice to many generations, and I think we, as artists, can be a part of creating a better world.

I think art can really serve to inspire a movement - and, of course, it has in the past. The Civil Rights movement wouldn't have the same resonance without the songs from everyone from Pete Seeger to Odetta to James Brown.

Write plays that matter. Raise the stakes. Shout, yell, holler, but make yourself heard. It's time for playwrights to reclaim the theatre. We do that by speaking from the heart about the things that matter most to us. If a play isn't worth dying for, maybe it isn't worth writing.