Stephen Nachmanovitch Quotes

41 Sourced Quotes

To do anything artistically you have to acquire technique, but create through your technique and not with it.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
If a creative person has a sense of humor, a sense of style and a certain amount of stubbornness, he finds a way to do what he needs to in spite of the obstacles.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
If we split practice from the real thing, neither one of them will be very real.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
Writing, playing, composing, painting, reading, listening, looking-all require that we submit to being swept away by Eros, to a transformation of self of the kind that happens when we fall in love.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
Surrender means cultivating a comfortable attitude toward not knowing, being nurtured by the mystery of moments that are dependably surprising, ever fresh.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
Here the artist is, as it were, an archaeologist, uncovering deeper and deeper strata as he works, recovering not an ancient civilization, but something as yet unborn, unseen, unheard, except by the inner eye, the inner ear. He is not just removing apparent surfaces from some external object, he is removing apparent surface from the Self, revealing his original nature.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
Paradoxically, the more you are yourself, the more universal your message. As you develop and individuate more deeply, you break through into deeper layers of the collective consciousness and the collective unconsciousness.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
In improvisation, there is only one time. This is what computer people call real time. The time of inspiration, the time of technically structuring and realizing... the time of playing it, and the time of communicating with the audience, are all one.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
Play is the taproot from which original art springs. It is the raw stuff that the artist channels with all his learning and technique.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
We provide both irritation and inspiration for each other- the grist for each other's pearl making.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
Looking at the creative process is like looking into a crystal: no matter which facet we gaze into, we see all the others reflected.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
Every attempt we make is imperfect; yet each one of those imperfect attempts is an occasion for a delight unlike anything else on earth.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
Play, intrinsically rewarding, doesn't cost anything; as soon as you put a price on it, it becomes, to some extent, not play.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
Artwork is not thought up in consciousness and then, as a separate phase, executed by the hand. The hand surprises us creates and solves problems on its own. Often, enigmas that baffle our brains are dealt with easily, unconsciously, by the hand.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
Brahms once remarked that the mark of an artist is how much he throws away. Nature, the great creator, is always throwing things away. A frog lays several million eggs at a sitting. Only a few dozen of these become tadpoles, and only a few of those become frogs. We can let imagination and practice be as profligate as nature.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
We can depend on the world being a perpetual surprise in perpetual motion.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
Faithfulness to the moment and to the present circumstance entails continuous surrender.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
Every moment of life is unique-a kiss, a sunset, a dance, a joke. None will ever recur in quite the same way. Each happens only once in the history of the universe.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
Play, creativity, art, spontaneity, all these experiences are their own rewards and are blocked when we perform for reward or punishment, profit or loss.

Stephen Nachmanovitch
There are only people doing their imperfect best at doing their imperfect jobs

Stephen Nachmanovitch