Louise Berliawsky Nevelson Quotes

Any artist is an instrument-and that's exactly why you can't do it all the time. You can only do it when it's happening, when it's coming through. No matter how much you may want to do it, if it's not happening then it's simply not happening.

I could never make a ballet by wrinkling my brow and concentrating. If you set out deliberately to make a masterpiece, how will you ever get it finished?

The creative process is a cocktail of instinct, skill, culture and a highly creative feverishness.

You can't slot a time and a space and think 'ok now it's time to sit and compose.' It just doesn't work like that for me.

I'm a bit like a sponge. When I'm not writing I absorb life like water. When I write I squeeze the sponge a little - and out comes, not water but ink.

My discussion with Keith Richards about the creative process led me to believe that there's an invisible presence of a stream of ever-flowing creativity that we overhear-all you have to do is pull up the antenna and dial it in. This presence allows you to maintain your sense of origin and move forward.

Someone once asked me... whether I waited for inspiration. My answer was: "Every day!"

The biggest part of painting perhaps is faith, and waiting receptively, content to go any way, not planning or forcing. The fear, though, is laziness. It is so easy to drift and finally be tossed up on the beach, derelict.

I think good artists know when they're on a roll, and they recognize when lightning is striking. It's a very fortunate thing to have that inspiration and not to overanalyze it or mess with it; you just follow it if you love what you do.

I'm very interested to see how this new painting will go - I know I want it big and stark, and as I said, I follow the muse, and that's when it always works perfectly for me.

Artwork is not like a commercial business; there is no such thing as a schedule for art. You can't hurry art.

For hundreds of years people have talked about artists having inspiration, but often, some persons would say, write us a symphony or write us a song, on commission. The artists would come up with a masterpiece without waiting to have their muse inspire them.

The songs come along at their own pace when they are ready.

The artist discards all theories, both his own and those of others. He forgets everything when he is in front of his canvas.

Being creative is my idea of heaven. I'm just incredibly fortunate that I can do it in artwork. Watercolor is what I started out with. What I love about watercolor is that a lot of happy accidents occur.

I think it's bad to talk about one's present work, for it spoils something at the root of the creative act. It discharges the tension.

When people think of someone being prolific, it's like, 'He's got a vault with 5,000 songs in it,' or something, but I just kind of pick them out of the air when they float by.

Anytime that I've felt uninspired, I don't force myself to sit down and write. I only do it when I feel the impulse.

Little moments of excitement shape the sound of a record. You don't have anything, and then you start to have little parts that give you the energy to move forward because you start to see something.

I don't paint every day. I'm not that motivated. I don't do anything the same every day.

The music, for me, doesn't come on a schedule. I don't know when it's going to come, and when it does, I want it out.

I love art so much because of curiosity. At the start of a painting, I know 10 percent of what the painting will be, and then I have to improvise the whole thing.

Even if you're not releasing songs, the act of creativity is important. That's the part I love, when you're in the moment. The rest of it I'm not particularly interested in at all.

Being in a studio is quite a creative and energetic process.

People have talents that are different. Where does the creative flow come from - inside us or from a higher power? I don't ask any questions. I just write it down.