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I never studied with Balanchine, but his work was very important to me.

Twyla Tharp

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Twyla Tharp
Age: 83
Born: 1941
Born: July 1
Ballet Dancer
Choreographer
Dancer
Writer
Portland
Indiana
Studied
Important
Work
Never

More quotes by Twyla Tharp

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I’m much stronger than most women. Consequently, when I work with men, or when I’m partnered by men... We can actually go into kinds of movement that haven’t been available before, simply because I’ve strengthened myself as a woman, not because I’ve weakened him.
Twyla Tharp
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The disasteris not the money, although the money will be missed. The disaster is the disrespect--this belief that the arts are dispensable, that they're not critical to a culture's existence.
Twyla Tharp
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There really is nothing I ever had access to that I didn't appreciate.
Twyla Tharp
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There is obviously a power and a truth in action that doesn't lie, which words easily can do.
Twyla Tharp
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Usually kids who are talented have the brashness to think they can do anything, but they don't often get the chance to see how close they can come.
Twyla Tharp
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There are as many forms of memory as there are ways of perceiving, and every one of them is worth mining for inspiration.
Twyla Tharp
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There are so few people who can really take hold of art and sort of eat and chew it up. Somehow it's got to be held special, sacred in a corner, and if you don't do the same thing with it, if you're not equally reverential, serious, and pompous about it, well, then you're not a great artist. Who needs that?
Twyla Tharp
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You don't get into the mood to create – it's discipline.
Twyla Tharp
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You have to believe there's something at the other side. And you have to have faith in yourself. You have to think that you have the tools to accomplish it.
Twyla Tharp
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Once you accept the power of spine in the creative act, you will become much more efficient in your creativity. You will still get lost on occasion, but having a spine will anchor you.
Twyla Tharp
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In creative endeavors luck is a skill.
Twyla Tharp
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I work because I have issues and questions and feelings and thoughts that I want to have a look at. I'm not in need of, or wanting, particularly, to know what other folk are up to.
Twyla Tharp
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Energy and time are finite resources conserving them is very important.
Twyla Tharp
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But obligation, I eventually saw, is not the same as commitment, and it's certainly not an acceptable reason to stick with something that isn't working
Twyla Tharp
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The ballet needs to tell its own story in such a way it can be received without having to be translated into language.
Twyla Tharp
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There's a paradox in the notion that creativity should be a habit. We think of creativity as a way of keeping everything fresh and new, while habit implies routine and repetition. That paradox intrigues me because it occupies the place where creativity and skill rub up against each other.
Twyla Tharp
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Modern dancers should be doing things no one else is doing, and it should come from the gut.
Twyla Tharp
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I always, somehow, knew that I was going to dance.
Twyla Tharp
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Doing is better than not doing, and if you do something badly you'll learn to do it better.
Twyla Tharp
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I think people want very much to simplify their lives enough so that they can control the things that make it possible to sleep at night.
Twyla Tharp