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First we have to believe, and then we believe.

Martha Graham

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Martha Graham
Age: 96 †
Born: 1894
Born: May 11
Died: 1991
Died: April 1
Artist
Ballet Dancer
Ballet Master
Choreographer
Costume Designer
Dancer
Music Pedagogue
Pittsburg
Pennsylvania
Martha Grehem
Dance
Belief
Firsts
First
Believe

More quotes by Martha Graham

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I don't think in art there is ever a precedent each moment is a new one and terrifying and threatening and bursting with hope.
Martha Graham
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It is not your business to determine how good it is, nor how valuable it is, nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open.
Martha Graham
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Dance is the landscape of man's soul.
Martha Graham
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You can be Eastern or Burmese or what have you, but the function of the body and the awareness of the body results in dance and you become a dancer, not just a human being.
Martha Graham
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I don't try to tell the dancers exactly what a dance means before they do it.
Martha Graham
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There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all of time, this expression is unique.
Martha Graham
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Freedom to a dancer means discipline. That is what technique is for -- liberation.
Martha Graham
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Dancing is a very living art. It is essentially of the moment, although a very old art. A dancer's art is lived while he is dancing. Nothing is left of his art except the pictures and the memories--when his dancing days are over.
Martha Graham
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You give all your life to doing this one thing. It sounds grim, it sounds frightening - it isn't - it has a great gaiety at times and a great wonder.
Martha Graham
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Our arms start from the back because they were once wings.
Martha Graham
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Dance is communication, and so the great challenge is to speak clearly, beautifully and with inevitability.
Martha Graham
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In the end, it all comes down to the art of breathing.
Martha Graham
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You will only get out of a dance class what you bring to it. Learn by practice.
Martha Graham
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A dancer must listen to his body and pay homage to it. Behind the movement lies this terrible, driving passion, this necessity. I won't settle for anything less.
Martha Graham
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The body is shaped, disciplined, honored, and in time, trusted.
Martha Graham
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'Age' is the acceptance of a term of years. But maturity is the glory of years.
Martha Graham
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It's what I always wanted to do, to show the laughter, the fun, the joy of dance.
Martha Graham
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The main thing, of course, always, is the fact that there is only one of you in the world, just one, and if that is not fulfilled then something has been lost. Ambition is not enough necessity is everything.
Martha Graham
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I use the words gods and goddesses principally, I think, to mean beautiful bodies - bodies that are absolute instruments. And I believe in discipline, I believe in a very definite technique.
Martha Graham
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I am certain that movement never lies. There is only one law of posture I have been able to discover - the perpendicular line connecting heaven and earth.
Martha Graham