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The content and thematic materials of dance is, of itself, like boxing. You play tennis and baseball. But boxing is not a sport you play: you stand up and do it.

Twyla Tharp

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Twyla Tharp
Age: 83
Born: 1941
Born: July 1
Ballet Dancer
Choreographer
Dancer
Writer
Portland
Indiana
Materials
Dance
Stand
Thematic
Sports
Boxing
Play
Tennis
Like
Sport
Content
Baseball

More quotes by Twyla Tharp

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Skill is how you close the gap between what you can see in your mind's eye and what you can produce the more skill you have, the more sophisticated and accomplished your ideas can be. With absolute skill comes absolute confidence.
Twyla Tharp
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I think that probably the moments of discovery do come from a place that is not totally organized. Order is something that we already know about. Discoveries are in a place we don't already know about.
Twyla Tharp
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I don't mean this, but I'm going to say it anyway. I don't really think of pop art and serious art as being that far apart.
Twyla Tharp
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I feel I can handle the architecture of dance as well as anybody.
Twyla Tharp
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That's what improvising is like for me. There's no tollbooth between my impulse and my action.
Twyla Tharp
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Optimism with some experience behind it is much more energizing than plain old experience with a certain degree of cynicism.
Twyla Tharp
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Everything is raw material. Everything is relevant. Everything is usable. Everything feeds into my creativity. But without proper preparation, I cannot see it, retain it, and use it.
Twyla Tharp
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The formal education that I received made little sense to me.
Twyla Tharp
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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.
Twyla Tharp
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You don't have a really good idea until you combine two little ideas.
Twyla Tharp
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You can keep on chewing gum for ten hours, but after about a minute and a half you've got all the good out of it.
Twyla Tharp
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When I'm in the studio, when I'm warm, when I'm what people call improvising, I feel a very special connection. I feel the most right. I don't want to become too mystic about this, but things feel as though they're in the best order at that particular moment.
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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I had received my first establishment grants in response to applications filed the year before. To the pages of baffling forms I had simply attached a handwritten note saying, 'I make dances, not applications. Send the money. Love, Twyla.
Twyla Tharp
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I was interested in becoming a show dancer, for which I tried, but I'm not tall enough.
Twyla Tharp
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Traveling the paths of greatness, even in someone else's footprints, is a vital means to acquiring skill.
Twyla Tharp
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Every dance I make is a dive into this well of ancient memory.
Twyla Tharp
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I don't believe in rushing and saying this is done and over with. That form of rebellion doesn't make sense to me. I've always attempted to familiarize myself with the traditions, and consider that a responsibility of the artist.
Twyla Tharp
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Creativity requires quite a lot of faith - not just in yourself but also in the knowledge that you have the right to proceed, even when you may not know exactly what you're doing.
Twyla Tharp
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I was valedictorian. Did I enjoy going to school? I hated it. It wasn't a choice on my part, it was expected.
Twyla Tharp