Quote

I did not choose to be a dancer. I was chosen.

Martha Graham

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Dancer
Chosen
Dance
Choose

More quotes by Martha Graham

Image
I'd rather an audience like me than dislike me, but I'd rather they disliked me than be apathetic, because that is the kiss of death.
Martha Graham
Image
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
Image
Great dancers are not great because of their technique, they are great because of their passion.
Martha Graham
Image
Some of you are doomed to be artists.
Martha Graham
Image
The center of the stage is where I am.
Martha Graham
Image
The unique must be fulfilled.
Martha Graham
Image
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
Image
Our arms start from the back because they were once wings.
Martha Graham
Image
We look at the dance to impart the sensation of living in an affirmation of life, to energize the spectator into keener awareness of the vigor, the mystery, the humor, the variety, and the wonder of life. This is the function of the American dance.
Martha Graham
Image
I have spent all my life with dance and being a dancer. It's permitting life to use you in a very intense way. Sometimes it is not pleasant. Sometimes it is fearful. But nevertheless it is inevitable.
Martha Graham
Image
You have no right to go before a public without an adequate technique, just because you feel. Anything feels - a leaf feels, a storm feels - what right have you to do that? You have to have speech, and it's a cultivated speech.
Martha Graham
Image
You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work. You have to keep open and aware directly to the urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open.
Martha Graham
Image
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
Image
First we have to believe, and then we believe.
Martha Graham
Image
My childhood years were a balance of dark and light.
Martha Graham
Image
I believe that we learn by practice.
Martha Graham
Image
Theater used to be a verb it used to be an act. But nowadays it is just a noun. It is a place.
Martha Graham
Image
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
Image
Misery is a communicable disease.
Martha Graham
Image
Every dance is a kind of fever chart, a graph of the heart.
Martha Graham