Quotes by Twyla Tharp - Page 6

At the ballet classes I took when I first came to New York, I would see great dancers like Cynthia Gregory and Lupe Serrano. I would look at them and study what they could do, and what I couldn't do. And then I'd think maybe they should try what I could do.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Ballet
Classes
Dancers
Copy Quote
When I'm in the studio, when I'm warm, when I'm what people call improvising, I feel a very special connection. I feel the most right. I don't want to become too mystic about this, but things feel as though they're in the best order at that particular moment.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Order
People
Special
Copy Quote
It's always a problem, getting the curtain in at the end of the first act; having enough of a resolve so that you can bring the curtain in and then opening the show a second time is a little bizarre as a tradition. I've always preferred to go straight through.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Bizarre
Opening
Resolve
Time Always Enough
Time Enough Always
Curtain
Preferred
Copy Quote
Nobody worked harder than Mozart. By the time he was twenty-eight years old, his hands were deformed because of all the hours he had spent practicing, performing, and gripping a quill pen to compose. That's the missing element in the popular portrait of Mozart.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Gripping
Missing
Performing
By The Time
Compose
Deformed
Element
Mozart
Pen
Portrait
Practicing
Quill
Copy Quote
I’m much stronger than most women. Consequently, when I work with men, or when I’m partnered by men... We can actually go into kinds of movement that haven’t been available before, simply because I’ve strengthened myself as a woman, not because I’ve weakened him.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Men
Kind
Stronger
Copy Quote
I began to discriminate between fear and excitement. The two, though very close, are completely different. Fear is negative excitement, choking your imagination. Real excitement produces an energy that overcomes apprehension and makes you want to close in on your goal.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Dance
Motivational
Real
Two
Copy Quote
What I do remember is visualization of the sound of music, seeing bodies in movement in relation to how music sounded, because my mother practiced at the keyboard a lot and I also went to her lessons. As a two year old, three year old I remember seeing things in movement.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Lessons
Mother
Relation
Sound Of Music
Two Year Olds
Visualization
Years
Bodies
Practiced
Copy Quote
In order to be creative, you have to know how to prepare to be creative.....A lot of habitually creative people have preparation rituals linked to the setting in which they choose to start their day. By putting themselves into that environment, they begin their creative day.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Creative
Order
People
Copy Quote
I grew up in a drive-in theater, from the time I was 8, working in a snack bar watching four features every week. It was silent theater in the sense that this was a drive-in, which meant that I often saw the films going with no sound. But I learned to tell stories through action.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Features
Silent
Bar
Drive-In
Snack
Copy Quote
The artist doesn't really think about consequences - he or she does the work, stands back and looks at and thinks, 'Hmm, that could have worked better like this.' But as a person who needs to sell tickets to do the next work, one needs to analyze how it does or does not hit its mark.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Hmm
Mark
Tickets
Work Better Person
Consequences
Analyze
He Or She
Stands
Copy Quote
Later in life, one of the compensations is gliding effortlessly into focus in a thing. Since it is who we are, anything that is not the focus or supportive thereof is just not us. Even outside issues, when they arise, are interesting in that they only help define the focus more clearly.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Interesting
Issues
Later In Life
Copy Quote
I walk into a large white room. It's a dance studio in midtown Manhattan. The room is clean, virtually spotless if you don’t count the thousands of skid marks and footprints left there by dancers rehearsing. Other than the mirrors, the boom box, the skid marks, and me, the room is empty.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Dancer
Mirrors
White
Copy Quote
There's a paradox in the notion that creativity should be a habit. We think of creativity as a way of keeping everything fresh and new, while habit implies routine and repetition. That paradox intrigues me because it occupies the place where creativity and skill rub up against each other.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Inspirational
Creativity
Thinking
Copy Quote
When creativity has become your habit; when you've learned to manage time, resources, expectations, and the demands of others; when you understand the value and place of validation, continuity, and purity of purpose, then you're on the way to an artist's ultimate goal; the achievement of mastery.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Artist
Creativity
Validation
Copy Quote
There are so few people who can really take hold of art and sort of eat and chew it up. Somehow it's got to be held special, sacred in a corner, and if you don't do the same thing with it, if you're not equally reverential, serious, and pompous about it, well, then you're not a great artist. Who needs that?
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Art
People
Special
Copy Quote
My mother was a dominant force in my life. She had a very specific idea about education, which was: you should know everything about everything. It was quite simple. There was no exclusivity, and there really was no judgment, which is a good thing for someone who still thinks of themselves as a very basic American.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Education
Mother
Simple
Copy Quote
I used to say to myself, 'Well, in the old days everybody danced because they loved to dance, and there was none of this professional garbage going on about how much can you get for this or that or the other, or any of the kinds of things that insecurity can sometimes promote. Sometimes it's for the wrong reasons.'
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Dance
Garbage
Insecurity
Old Days
Wrong Reasons
How Much
None
Professional
Promote
Reasons
Copy Quote
Confidence is a trait that has to be earned honestly and refreshed constantly; you have to work as hard to protect your skills as you did to develop them. . . The one thing that creative souls around the world have in common is that they all have to practice to maintain their skills. Art is a vast democracy of habit.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Art
Practice
Skills
Copy Quote
I repeat the wake-up, the workout, the quick shower, the breakfast of three hard-boiled egg whites and a cup of coffee, the hour to make my morning calls and deal with correspondence, the two hours of stretching and working out ideas by myself in the studio ... That's my day, every day. A dancer's life is all about repetition.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Dance
Morning
Coffee
Workout
Copy Quote
Proust writes, he remembers, physically. He depends on his body to give him the information that will bring him to the past. His book is called 'In Search of Lost Time,' and he does it through the senses. He does it through smell. He does it through feeling. He does it through texture. It is all physically driven, that language.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Depends
Driven
Proust
Senses
Smell
Texture
Remembers
Search
Copy Quote
Don’t sign on for more problems than you must. Resist the temptation to involve yourself in other people’s zones of expertise and responsibility. Monitor troublesome situations if you need to, but don’t insert yourself unless you’re running out of time and a solution is nowhere in sight. In short, stifle your inner control freak.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Running
Responsibility
Sight
Copy Quote
A tough manager will have realistic quotas for his employees that he keeps to himself and aggressively stretch quotas, anywhere from ten percent higher to a lot more, which he imposes on his staff. If his people miss the stretch numbers but exceed the realistic goals, he's happy. If he's a superb manager, he knows how far they can stretch without breaking.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Leadership
Goal
Numbers
People
Copy Quote
The last two - distractions and fears - are the dangerous ones. They're the habitual demons that invade the launch of any project. No one starts a creative endeavor without a certain amount of fear; the key is to learn how to keep free-floating fears from paralyzing you before you've begun. When I feel that sense of dread, I try to make it as specific as possible.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Creative
Keys
Two
Copy Quote
After so many years, I've learned that being creative is a full-time job with its own daily patterns. That's why writers, for example, like to establish routines for themselves. The most productive ones get started early in the morning, when the world is quiet, the phones aren't ringing, and their minds are rested, alert, and not yet polluted by other people's words.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Jobs
Morning
Phones
Copy Quote
When you're in a groove, you're not spinning your wheels; you're moving forward in a straight and narrow path without pauses or hitches. You're unwavering, undeviating, and unparalleled in your purpose. A groove is the best place in the world. Because when you are in it, you have the freedom to explore, where everything you question leads you to new avenues and new routes.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Moving
Spinning
World
Copy Quote
The irony of multitasking is that it's exhausting: when you're doing two or three things simultaneously, you use more energy than the sum of energy required to do each task independently. You're also cheating yourself because your're not doing anything excellently. You're compromising your virtuosity. In the words of T. S. Elliot, you're 'distracted from distractions by distractions'.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Cheating
Energy
Two
Copy Quote
Destiny, quite often, is a determined parent. Mozart was hardly some naive prodigy who sat down at the keyboard and, with God whispering in his ears, let music flow from his fingertips. It's a nice image for selling tickets to movies, but whether or not God has kissed your brow, you still have to work. Without learning and preparation, you won't know how to harness the power of that kiss.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Destiny
Kissing
Nice
Copy Quote
Everything that happens in my day is a transaction between the external world and my internal world. Everything is raw material. Everything is relevant. Everything is usable. Everything feeds into my creativity. But without proper preparation, I cannot see it, retain it, and use it. Without the time and effort invested in getting ready to create, you can be hit by a thunderbolt and it'll just leave you stunned.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Inspirational
Creativity
Effort
Copy Quote
I cannot overstate how much a generous spirit contributes to good luck. Look at the luckiest people around you, the ones you envy, the ones who seem to have destiny falling habitually into their laps. If they're anything like the fortunate people I know, they're prepared, they're always working at their craft, they're alert, they involve their friends in their work, and they tend to make others feel lucky to be around them.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Destiny
Fall
Good Luck
Copy Quote
Creativity is more about taking the facts, fictions, and feelings we store away and finding new ways to connect them. What we're talking about here is metaphor. Metaphor is the lifeblood of all art, if it is not art itself. Metaphor is our vocabulary for connecting what we are experiencing now with what we have experienced before. It's not only how we express what we remember , it's how we interpret it - for ourselves and others.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Art
Creativity
Talking
Copy Quote
It takes skill to bring something you've imagined into the world: to use words to create believable lives, to select the colors and textures of paint to represent a haystack at sunset, to combine ingredients to make a flavorful dish. No one is born with that skill. It is developed through exercise, through repitition, through a blend of learning and reflection that's both painstaking and rewarding. And it takes time. . . . If art is the bridge between what you see in your mind and what the world sees, then skill is how you build that bridge.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Art
Exercise
Sunset
Copy Quote
In the end, there is no ideal condition for creativity. What works for one person is useless for another. The only criterion is this: Make it easy on yourself. Find a working environment where the prospect of wrestling with your muse doesn't scare you, doesn't shut you down. It should make you want to be there, and once you find it, stick with it. To get the creative habit, you need a working environment that's habit-forming. All preferred working states, no matter how eccentric, have one thing in common: When you enter into them, they compel you to get started.
Twyla Tharp / Dancer
Creative
Creativity
Wrestling
Copy Quote

Related Dancer Authors

Yvonne Rainer
Dancer
Saturday, Nov 24, 1934
Witney Carson
Dancer
Sunday, Oct 17, 1993
Wayne Sleep
Dancer
Saturday, Jul 17, 1948
Wade Robson
Dancer
Friday, Sep 17, 1982
Vladimir Vasiliev
Dancer
Thursday, Apr 18, 1940
Vivian Nixon
Dancer
Wednesday, May 30, 1984
Vera De Bosset
Dancer
Saturday, Jan 07, 1888
Friday, Sep 17, 1982
Twyla Tharp
Dancer
Tuesday, Jul 01, 1941
Tristan Macmanus
Dancer
Friday, Jul 23, 1982
Travis Wall
Dancer
Wednesday, Sep 16, 1987
Tommy The Clown
Dancer
Terence Lewis
Dancer
Thursday, Apr 10, 1975
Tami Stronach
Dancer
Monday, Jul 31, 1972
Stephen Boss
Dancer
Siobhan Davies
Dancer
Monday, Sep 18, 1950

View All Dancer Quotes

Top Authors

Carl Jung
Psychiatrist
Monday, Jul 26, 1875
Tuesday, Jun 06, 1961
Albert Camus
Author
Friday, Nov 07, 1913
Monday, Jan 04, 1960
Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
Writer
Thursday, Aug 28, 1749
Thursday, Mar 22, 1832
Kobe Bryant
Basketball Player
Wednesday, Aug 23, 1978
Stephen Covey
Author
Monday, Oct 24, 1932
Monday, Jul 16, 2012
Marcus Aurelius
Roman Emperor
Saturday, Apr 26, 0121
Friday, Mar 17, 0180
Niccolo Machiavelli
Historian
Monday, May 03, 1469
Tuesday, Jun 21, 1527
Vincent Van Gogh
Painter
Wednesday, Mar 30, 1853
Tuesday, Jul 29, 1890
Friedrich Nietzsche
Philologist
Tuesday, Oct 15, 1844
Saturday, Aug 25, 1900
Dwight D. Eisenhower
34Th U.s. President
Tuesday, Oct 14, 1890
Friday, Mar 28, 1969
Henry David Thoreau
Author
Saturday, Jul 12, 1817
Tuesday, May 06, 1862
Thomas Jefferson
3Rd US President
Saturday, Apr 13, 1743
Tuesday, Jul 04, 1826
Kim Kardashian
Television Personality
Tuesday, Oct 21, 1980
Robert Frost
Poet
Thursday, Mar 26, 1874
Tuesday, Jan 29, 1963
Bob Marley
Singer
Tuesday, Feb 06, 1945
Monday, May 11, 1981

View All Authors

Twyla Tharp Quotes - Page 6

App & Tools

Related Dancer Authors

Popular Topic Tags

Top Authors

Share This Page

Stay Connected

App & Tools

Related Dancer Authors

Popular Topic Tags

Top Authors

Share This Page