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Never worry that rote exercises aimed at developing skills will suffocate creativity. At the same time, it's important to recognize that demonstrating great technique is not the same as being creative.

Twyla Tharp

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Twyla Tharp
Age: 83
Born: 1941
Born: July 1
Ballet Dancer
Choreographer
Dancer
Writer
Portland
Indiana
Time
Skills
Suffocate
Exercise
Rote
Creativity
Aimed
Worry
Demonstrating
Creative
Exercises
Important
Developing
Great
Technique
Never
Recognize

More quotes by Twyla Tharp

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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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Dancing is like bank robbery, it takes split-second timing.
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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.
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You only need one good reason to commit to an idea, not four hundred. But if you have four hundred reasons to say yes and one reason to say no, the answer is probably no.
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Miloš Forman is a great director Jim Brooks is a wonderful writer and director.
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Whether it's a painter finding his way each morning to the easel, or a medical researcher returning daily to the laboratory, the routine is as much a part of the creative process as the lightning bolt of inspiration, maybe more.
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While most people in the arts think they have to be constantly looking forward to be edgy and creative....the real secret of creativity is to go back and remember.
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No one is born with skill. It is developed through exercise, through repetition, through a blend of learning and reflection that's both painstaking and rewarding. And it takes time.
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Every dance I make is a dive into this well of ancient memory.
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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.
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I am fairly concise when I work and I work quickly because I think work is done better in a high gear than done our in a gear when everyone's exhausted. Get focused, do it!
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I have the wherewithal to challenge myself for my entire life. That's a great gift.
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I do believe that when dancing is right, the movement possesses a logic common to us all.
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A dancer's life is all about repetition.
Twyla Tharp
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Generosity is luck going in the opposite direction, away from you. If you're generous to someone, if you do something to help him out, you are in effect making him lucky. This is important. It's like inviting yourself into a community of good fortune.
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Creativity is an act of defiance.
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You double your intensity with skill.
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A lot of people insisted on a wall between modern dance and ballet, that the two disciplines were totally separate, and if you did one, you couldn’t do the other. I’m beginning to think that walls are very unhealthy things.
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Mastery is an elusive concept. You never know when you achieve it absolutely and it may not help you to feel you've attained it. We can recognize it more readily in others than we can in ourselves. We have to discover our own definition of it.
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I repeat the wake-up, the workout, the quick shower, the breakfast of three hard-boiled egg whites and a cup of coffee, the hour to make my morning calls and deal with correspondence, the two hours of stretching and working out ideas by myself in the studio ... That's my day, every day. A dancer's life is all about repetition.
Twyla Tharp