Quote

I think we're put out into the world to forge relationships with people. Those can be as small as buying coffee from someone or as large as a marriage. The important thing is that we try to make connections or have experiences with other humans. Otherwise what's the point of being on this earth?

Laurel Nakadate

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Laurel Nakadate
Age: 48
Born: 1975
Born: December 15
Artist
Film Director
Austin
Texas
Make
Small
Buying
Think
Point
Coffee
Thinking
Someone
Connections
World
Earth
Experiences
People
Humans
Relationships
Important
Otherwise
Thing
Large
Trying
Marriage
Forge

More quotes by Laurel Nakadate

Image
I'm more interested in the idea of role-playing in general than the idea of role-playing in art. I like the childlike quality of making pretend or the optimistic idea of pretending something's happening when it's not.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
In general, I wait to be approached. I want to be the one who's hunted, I want to be the one who people take interest in.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
Everything is mediated. Everything is influenced by its maker. And happily, right? I'm so happy everyone leaves fingerprints on things whether they like it or not. Fingerprints solve crimes. They're profound. They're your best and worst friend and you were born with them and you can't get away from them without a lot of pain and sandpaper.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
What I love about photography is that nothing is really as it seems.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
The amazing thing is that we live our lives with the hope that things will go right, that things will happen. And all along the way, we're inspired by the unknown and the unnameable. The minute you can fully describe something it's gone.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
I think that fact alone levels everything. Slapstick amazes me, the folly of humans today, the Ponzi schemes, giving birth to eight babies at once, it's amazing... And I know, it's horrible to have your money stolen and all that, but those are amazing stories.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
[Photography] ties back into this feeling of wanting to watch things fall and the moment before they break. Fireworks are that way for me - this lovely thing that blows up and is gone. It all goes back to this desire to record things before they disappear - the original reason we take pictures, right?
Laurel Nakadate
Image
Well, my intention is to make work about being uncomfortable. About being in a world that isn't always the world you want to be part of. I talk a lot about the free fall, the moment in the scene where gravity takes over, and the beautiful awkwardness when gravity wins. Gravity is hilarious. Gravity always wins.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
I have very little interest in endlessly telling people about my artistic process. It sounds like throwing yourself against a wall and crying. It's not interesting to most people. It's interesting to yourself. But it's your problem, not anyone else's.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
Death is sad, yes, but there are some great laughs you can find there.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
I never want to make videos with people who don't want to make them with me. I don't want to force people to take part. Only people who want to collaborate. And that's important because otherwise, the videos wouldn't work. Them choosing to take part is very important to the videos.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
Although I use myself in my videos, I really see myself as a character. When I look at myself, when I sit and edit, I never think, That's me. I think, This is a character, and how do I edit this to tell a story?
Laurel Nakadate
Image
I love fiction. I like reading short stories. Cupcakes, pop songs, Polaroids, and short stories. They all raise and answer questions in a short space. I like Lorrie Moore. Amy Hempel. Tim O'Brien. Raymond Carver. All the heartbreakers.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
I think it's a really good idea to be bumping into all kinds of people in all kinds of ways. So you make art with strangers. You give a reading. You move somewhere new and try to build a life. You grapple with humanity.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
I believe that I am some sort of fiction writer and I'm using myself in my work because I'm the person I'm most convenient to use!
Laurel Nakadate
Image
I shot my undergraduate work on 35mm. I love the way it looks, but I haven't shot film in a while. If you can avoid scanning, it makes your practice faster. Oh, and I shoot a lot of Polaroid, too. I have about five hundred Polaroids from my film that I hope to show soon.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
A cupcake is like a great pop song. The whole world in less than three minutes. And it's impossible to have a bad cupcake. In New York you walk everywhere. So I'm always looking, always on the eternal search for the perfect cupcake. I take them very seriously. It's like hunting and gathering for me.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
Things might not get better but they might not get worse. There's something sort of beautiful about that.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
I believe photography is about choosing to live, being brave. Looking is an act of courage. It's terrifying. It's possible to see too much, to witness things that we cannot hold.
Laurel Nakadate
Image
The act of recording requires you to look at and handle and touch things, so yes - art is more than just looking and recording. It's messy and time consuming and people might fall in love and get hurt.
Laurel Nakadate