Michelangelo Quotes

I have always tried to hide my efforts and wished my works to have a light joyousness of springtime which never lets anyone suspect the labors it has cost me.

For the essential thing about the work of art is that it is work, and very hard work too.

Why is it that we understand playing the cello will require work, but we attribute writing to the magic of inspiration?

Painting is as difficult as brain surgery. It's not that relaxing. But that's the discipline.

I do labor - it's part of the process. Writing is no easier today than it was in the beginning: writing well is very hard to do. Always.

The picture that looks as if it were done without an effort may have been a perfect battlefield in its making.

I might work on a painting for a month, but it has too look like I painted it in a minute.

People err who think my art comes easily to me. I assure you, dear friend, nobody has devoted so much time and thought to compositions as I. There is not a famous master whose music I have not industriously studied through many times.

I long so much to make beautiful things. But beautiful things require effort and disappointment and perseverance.

You don't know how much artists go through to make it look so easy. It's all in the practice.

Every play I do, every book I write, every painting I paint, I will struggle with. I don't know what it's like for a project to come easy.

Creative work is incredibly difficult, and that is where the tests lie.

Composing music is hard work.

A great painter can paint something really complex, but they can crystallize it into something really simple.

People want to be artists but don't want to do the ground work.

Great art is created only through diligent and painstaking effort to perfect and polish oneself.

Writing is a combination of intangible creative fantasy and appallingly hard work.

There are so many filmmakers who are so talented, and actors and writers who work so hard, and it's really hard to let your work enter the world.

An amateur may not be an artist, though an artist should be an amateur.

You're only kidding yourself if you put creativity before craft.

Without passion, all the skill in the world won't lift you above craft. Without skill, all the passion in the world will leave you eager but floundering. Combining the two is the essence of the creative life.

I have never heard a dancer asking for advice about how to stay focused on her footwork, or a painter complaining about the dull day-to-day task of painting. What task worth doing isn't worth daily effort? Do you think Michelangelo was having fun the whole time he was on his back painting the Sistine Chapel's ceiling?

When you set down the path to create art, whatever sort of art it is, understand that the path is neither short not easy. That means you must determine if the route is worth the effort. If it's not, dream bigger.

Acting is a grind, just like music is a grind. Sometimes it takes longer than what you can give.

People think that I play effortlessly. I remember doing a record date with Bill Evans and afterwards he said to me, you make it sound so easy but when I get right up next to you you're working hard and making it sound easy!