Quote

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

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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
Feel
Adequate
Feels
Storm
Technique
Speech
Public
Anything
Cultivated
Without
Leafs
Right
Leaf

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.
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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.
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There is a force, a quickness that is translated through you into action. If you block it, the world will not have it.
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First we have to believe, and then we believe.
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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.
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I don't try to tell the dancers exactly what a dance means before they do it.
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The next time you look into the mirror, just look at the way the ears rest next to the head look at the way the hairline grows think of all the little bones in your wrist. It is a miracle. And the dance is a celebration of that miracle.
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Think of the magic of that foot, comparatively small, upon which your whole weight rests. It's a miracle, and the dance is a celebration of that miracle.
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I love words very much. I've always loved to talk, and I've always love words — the words that rest in your mouth, what words mean and how you taste them and so on. And for me the spoken word can be used almost as a gesture.
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There is fatigue so great that the body cries, even in its sleep.
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The past is not dead it is not even past. People live on inner time the moment in which a decisive thought or feeling takes place can be at any time. Timeless feelings are common to all of us.
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The secret to dancing is that it is about everything except dancing.
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.
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Freedom to a dancer means discipline. That is what technique is for -- liberation.
Martha Graham
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I believe that we learn by practice.
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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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
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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
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Discipline is liberation.
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Fire is the test of gold adversity, of strong men.
Martha Graham