Successful Artists Quotes

Every successful artist comes from a family - parents or siblings or both - who, although equally gifted, chose not to pursue the treacherous and difficult path of the artist. ~ Chris Abani

I think a lot of the more successful artists of our time basically have barracudas for managers ~ Robben Ford

There is nothing fiercer than a failed artist. The energy remains, but, having no outlet, it implodes in a great black fart of rage which smokes up all the inner windows of the soul. Horrible as successful artists often are, there is nothing crueler or more vain than a failed artist. ~ Erica Jong

The art of compromise centers on the willingness to give up something in order to get something else in return. Successful artists get more than they give up. ~ Howard Raiffa

The one thing I've learned in the last ten years is that successful artists don't get paid to write and sing songs, they get paid for the psychological roller coaster they're going to have to ride. That's the hard work. ~ Enrique Iglesias

A roadblock for some is the catch-22 of feeling too amateur to begin. There's a purpose for the phrase 'fake it till you make it'. If you don't have all the pieces in place, act like you do. When in doubt, forge ahead with gay abandon! As I spoke to other successful artists about their early days, a recurring theme was the importance of making work. John Safran described it as 'jamming', while Ghost Patrol likened it to 'playing'. ~ Justin Heazlewood

Knowing now what goes into making a successful artist, it's disheartening. ~ Sia Furler

Success for an artist is completed work. Very successful artists complete a lot of work. It's that simple. ~ Paul Russo

I've had far more success than I ever expected. But I do think that a lot of successful artists have an aim to be successful, even if they don't outwardly sound like it. I never really expected success. ~ Jim Shaw

When I was a kid, I wanted to emulate Mel Blanc, who is arguably one of the most legendary voiceover recording artists of our time. I used to watch all the cartoons where he would voice Daffy, Elmer Fudd and Porky the Pig. I knew one day I wanted to do that. ~ Jesse McCartney

The overwhelming majority of people are comfortable with consensus, but successful investors tend to have a contrarian bent, ~ Seth Klarman

You can't have a hit every time. The main thing is to keep on working and not be afraid to take risks. It's better to do something that's not perfect and successful every time. It's important to be fearless and move forward, to learn from what went wrong. ~ Jhumpa Lahiri

How is it that artists keep their powers of perception even in the days when life darkens? he asked himself. Thinking about it and taking as his model Grandfather, an artist in religion who had given to its study the devotion and the hours of discipline that a violinist devotes to his instrument, he thought that their perception was born of the faculty of wonder, deepening to meditation and to penetrating sight and so strong that it could last out a lifetime. Grandfather wondered, all day and every day, at the wisdom of God and the beauty of the world, and Ferranti had wondered at the waste and pain and frustration of life. ~ Elizabeth Goudge

It always makes me sad when I think of how I saw Wagner wasting his vitality, not only by singing their parts to some of his artists, but acting out the smallest details, and of how few they were who were responsive to his wishes. ~ Anton Seidl

Whatever team you go to, you want to have guys who help you be successful there. ~ Robert Griffin III

The American Dream means giving it your all, trying your hardest, accomplishing something. And then I'd add to that, giving something back. No definition of a successful life can do anything but include serving others. ~ George H. W. Bush

While it is easy to blame a teen for not succeeding, there are serious flaws in the school system that make it impossible for many students to feel successful in school. ~ William Glasser

Tom Stoppard was refreshingly candid when, after the successful premiere of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, he was asked what the play was about: It's about to make me a lot of money. ~ Clive James

The three of us have worked on the development of the small and totally harmless fruit fly, Drosophila. This animal has been extremely cooperative in our hands - and has revealed to us some of its innermost secrets and tricks for developing from a single celled egg to a complex living being of great beauty and harmony ... None of us expected that our work would be so successful or that our findings would ever have relevance to medicine. ~ Christiane Nusslein-Volhard

The great secret of a successful marriage is to treat all disasters as incidents and none of the incidents as disasters. ~ Harold Nicolson

I am very excited to be the head women's basketball coach at Beloit College, ... This is a great opportunity for me. I am looking forward to putting my stamp on the program. I am confident that I can and will be successful here. ~ Don Adams

I played an artist in a comedy called 'Rooster.' It was a zany film by Glen Larson, a friend who produced several successful television series including 'Magnum PI.' ~ LeRoy Neiman

The trick is to paint a picture that doesn't exist, and yet that fits perfectly into an artist's body of work. ~ Wolfgang Beltracchi

It's hard to measure success when we're dealing with between 500 and 5,000 years of patriarchy depending on which continent we sit, so I would say feminism has been successful and we have a huge distance to go, huge. ~ Gloria Steinem

The successful editor is one who is constantly finding newwriters, nurturing their talents, and publishing them with critical and financial success. ~ A. Scott Berg

It's the comedies and thrillers that are successful. People love horror, but in thrillers. Once you speak of pain and suffering it's a different matter. ~ Philippe Claudel

Men and women are equally intelligent, but separate factors, such as the abilities to focus, be collaborative and take other people's views into account, allow you to be successful. ~ Hanna Rosin

A movement only becomes a movement of substance, size, and power when the artists say 'we want to add our voice.' ~ Kumi Naidoo

To be sure, a good work of art can and will have moral consequences, but to demand of the artists moral intentions, means ruiningtheir craft. ~ Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

The best sculptor is the one who can most accurately reproduce in marble the image that he sees before him. The good cook follows the recipe. The pharmacist can utilize the many years of training of the most famous doctors from the best medical schools, if he just knows how to follow a prescription. Someone has said that science is just a collection of successful formulas. ~ Sterling W. Sill

If artists do see fields blue they are deranged, and should go to an asylum. If they only pretend to see them blue, they are criminals and should go to prison. ~ Adolf Hitler

The function of artists is "the mythologization of the world." ~ Joseph Campbell

The three ingredients of a successful union between two ... humor, commitment & undying love. ~ Bill Cosby

One woman's definition of success may not be another's. Is success, as the world defines it, an accomplishment in a society this sick? ~ Donna Lynn Hope

art is risk made visible ~ Arno Rafael Minkkinen

I want[ed] to make a show of really big pictures, because you see male artists doing it all the time. It just seemed like such a big egotistical thing. I thought, 'I don't know that many women that really do that ... Damn it, I'm gonna do that-make this really big picture.' ~ Cindy Sherman

The first secret of success: Believe in Yourself. Nothing changes in your life until you believe you can do things that are important to you. And if you have a low opinion of yourself, nobody else is likely to raise it. ~ Steve Goodier

I look at other artists who have had fabulous first albums, and you don't know what they're doing today. Who's to say I'll be an exception to that rule? ~ Toni Braxton

Behind every successful athlete there is a responsible coach. ~ Paul Bamikole

Heterosexual people, conforming to conventional dictate, are pillars of the society with which they are identified. Bisexuals and homosexuals, on the other hand, make valiant efforts to free themselves from the fetters of its conditioning power, and therefore come nearer to authentic behaviour. By reason of their rebellion, they are inclined to reject secondhand living as laid down by social conventions. It is not surprising that one finds many of them in the forefront of the fight for a new society, a society when authenticity is the guiding principle. But others are so much caught up in defensive behaviour that they neglect the pursuit of individual freedom in preference for a collective regimentation, which ensures a more successful battle against the cruel and subtle persecution by 'normal people'. Nevertheless, they are, by virtue of their still precarious position, well endowed to realize that the assignment of roles which rules every aspect of behaviour, permeates society like an infectious disease, that there is a social sickness about which leads via hypocrisy and falsity to alienation. Their own fringe position makes them particularly sensitive to the schizoid shortcomings of our society where nobody knows what the other thinks, or feels, and where relationships lose their essential qualities - solidarity and trust. ~ Charlotte Wolff, M.D.

For a Christian to say, "I will not have anything to do with the great and worthy works of artists whose lives were not good" is to fall into the impiety of questioning the wisdom of God in bestowing gifts of grace where He wills. ~ Frank E. Gaebelein

The most successful marketer becomes part of the lives of their followers. ~ Marsha Collier

I have done everything that I wanted to do, and I feel very blessed that I have been very successful on every area. So it's very exciting. There is nothing else to do. ~ Paris Hilton

Back in Australia, I did foster care for sick cats for years, and I was always most successful with the animals when I was given two - a brother and sister. ~ Jason Gann

I think that cars today are almost the exact equivalent of the great Gothic cathedrals; I mean the supreme creation of an era, conceived with passion by unknown artists, and consumed in image if not in usage by a whole population which appropriates them as a purely magical object. ~ Roland Barthes