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It's vital to establish some rituals-automatic but decisive patterns of behavior-at the beginning of the creative process, when you are most at peril of turning back, chickening out, giving up, or going the wrong way.

Twyla Tharp

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Twyla Tharp
Age: 83
Born: 1941
Born: July 1
Ballet Dancer
Choreographer
Dancer
Writer
Portland
Indiana
Beginning
Decisive
Creative
Peril
Wrong
Establish
Process
Ritual
Back
Vital
Giving
Turning
Going
Patterns
Rituals
Way
Behavior
Automatic

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I've always had to keep the walls in place, and the only way to do that is to keep yourself constantly occupied... From the time I was 8 years old, until I went to college, I worked... There was no social life.
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If you're speaking of love, you really must include the element of uncertainty - and perhaps it's best approached as the art of constant maintenance.
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In dreams, anything can be anything, and everybody can do. We can fly, we can turn upside down, we can transform into anything.
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I thought I had to make an impact on history. I had to become the greatest choreographer of my time. That was my mission. Posterity deals with us however it sees fit. But I gave it 20 years of my best shot.
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I have the wherewithal to challenge myself for my entire life. That's a great gift.
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Easily acquired. Inexpensive. Perfectly functional. Portable. Identifiable. Disposable. Eternal enough. These are my criteria for the perfect storage system. And I’ve found the answer in the simple file box.
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I had to become the greatest choreographer of my time. That was my mission, and that's what I set out to do.
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Miloš Forman is a great director Jim Brooks is a wonderful writer and director.
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Whenever I feel I'm working in a groove it's invariably because I feel I am being the benefactor in the situation rather than the beneficiary. I am sharing my art with others, lending my craft to theirs, interest-free with no IOU.
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Whom the gods wish to destroy, they give unlimited resources.
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I can't emphasize this idea enough. Getting involved with your collaborator's problems almost always distracts you from your own. That can be tempting. That can be a relief. But it usually leads to disaster.
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I have always felt one of the things dance should do - its business being so clearly physical - is challenge the culture's gender stereotypes.
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We're a machine and we have to be worked in the same way we have to be fed.
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One clear difference between art and commercial work is that commercial work is exploitive: the work may be high quality but the intention is to sell product or tickets. Art exists with or without ticket sales.
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The routine is as much a part of the creative process as the lightening bold of inspiration, maybe more. And this routine is available to everyone.
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Modern dancers should be doing things no one else is doing, and it should come from the gut.
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The necessity to constantly turn in an excellent performance, to be absolutely wedded to this dedication and this ideal means that as a child you're going to pay for it personally.
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I have not wanted to intimidate audiences. I have not wanted my dancing to be an elitist form. That doesn't mean I haven't wanted it to be excellent.
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Failing, and learning from it, is necessary. Unil you've done it, you're missing an important piece of your creative arsenal.
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I began ear training when I was about six months old. My mother was a concert pianist, and she started all of her children with music before they were a year old. Then she began to see that I had a musical gift...
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