MARINA ABRAMOVIC QUOTES
Serbian-born artist (1946- )
Early on, I had to perform wherever I had the possibility. My audience was anything from 10 to 40 people. Then I started getting invited to the festivals, finding curators interested in presenting new forms of art, and going to important exhibitions. So many artists don't have that kind of stamina. They need collectors to buy the work or galleries to take care of them. I didn't have a gallery for at least 30 years. I had to do everything myself.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Life's Work: An Interview with Marina Abramovic", Harvard Business Review, November 2016
Immaterial art is the strongest because there's no obstacle; there's just energy, and I believe in energy.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Once Upon a Time", Harper's Bazaar, Feb. 7, 2012
Your ego can become an obstacle to your work. If you start believing in your greatness, it is the death of your creativity.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Economist, Sep. 15, 2010
We never rehearse the full time. Yesterday we rehearsed only ten minutes. I don't want him to rehearse 30 minutes [of silence]. Why? Because from my performance experience, I realize that you absolutely have to rely on the energy of the public. If you just sit [in] the empty space for the 30-minute rehearsal, this is pure torture.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Guardian, December 7, 2015
I hate repetition. Even when I am home and have to buy milk, I go a different way each time to avoid having a habit of anything. Habits are really bad. So to me it is really important to live in what I call the spaces in-between. Bus stations, trains, taxis or waiting rooms in airports are the best places because you are open to destiny, you are open to everything and anything can happen.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Marina Abramovic Makes Sundance Shut Up", Interview Magazine
I didn't want children because I didn't want them to suffer. I had a dog, which suffered enough. I don't even want a goldfish or a turtle. I have a desert plant in my house that needs a glass of water maybe once a year, which I can deliver.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Life's Work: An Interview with Marina Abramovic", Harvard Business Review, November 2016
You create the space and time in which performance is going to happen. You physically enter. And whatever happens in that frame is the part of the piece that you can't control. If earthquake come, if electricity stop, if somebody scream or have epileptic attack. If people vomit. Everything is a part of it. The only thing is to give yourself completely.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Marina Abramovic: performance art is unconditional love", Sydney Morning Herald, June 12, 2015
The hardest thing is to do something which is close to nothing because it is demanding all of you.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
Here/Elsewhere, Jun. 26, 2012
If you learn to be a psychoanalyst, and you're working as a psychoanalyst, your job is in that context. If you're a baker, making bread, you're a baker. If you make the best bread in the world, you're not an artist, but if you bake the bread in the gallery, you're an artist. So the context makes the difference. And my context is art.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Marina Abramovic Makes Sundance Shut Up", Interview Magazine
There's nothing more tragic than artists from the 70s still doing art from the 70s.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Guardian, May 12, 2014
Ideas can come anytime, anywhere, while I am making this gazpacho or going to the bathroom. I am only interested in the ideas that become obsessive and make me feel uneasy. The ideas that I'm afraid of.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Economist, Sep. 15, 2010
Art should have political, spiritual, and surprising elements. It should try to find new language of communicating in order to give awareness to the public. Then every society can use the layer it needs at the moment. If one is interested in the political, they can take that. If the next one needs spiritual, it can be found in the same work. So if you just did one level, for example only political, it's like an old newspaper, you read it today and tomorrow it's old news. The art dies. Art with this kind of complexity has many lives where many societies can take something different at different times. It can live for centuries, otherwise who cares?
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Marina Abramovic Makes Sundance Shut Up", Interview Magazine
If you are not passionate in life, you can't be passionate in art.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
Walk Through Walls: A Memoir
From a very early time, I understood that I only learn from things I don't like. If you do things you like, you just do the same shit. You always fall in love with the wrong guy. Because there's no change. It's so easy to do things you like. But then, the thing is, when you're afraid of something, face it, go for it. You become a better human being.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Guardian, May 12, 2014
I believe stories are very important to all performances. The life story of the performer shapes their work, and the life stories of the audience alter how they receive the work, what they read into the performer.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
Huffington Post, Aug. 23, 2013
It was a little crazy. I realised then that the public can kill you. If you give them total freedom, they will become frenzied enough to kill you.... A man pressed the gun hard against my temple. I could feel his intent. And I heard the women telling the men what to do. The worst was the one man who was there always, just breathing. This, for me, was the most frightening thing. After the performance, I have one streak of white hair on my head. I cannot get rid of the feeling of fear for a long time. Because of this performance, I know where to draw the line so as not to put myself at such risk.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Guardian, Oct. 2, 2010
I realise the power of art that does not hang on the walls of galleries.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Guardian, Oct. 2, 2010
I hate studio. For me, studio is a trap to overproduce and repeat yourself. It is a habit that leads to art pollution.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Economist, Sep. 15, 2010
If you're a woman, it's almost impossible to establish a relationship. You're too much for everybody. It's too much. The woman always has to play this role of being fragile and dependent. And if you're not, they're fascinated by you, but only for a little while. And then they want to change you and crush you. And then they leave.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Guardian, May 12, 2014
The function of the artist in a disturbed society is to give awareness of the universe, to ask the right questions, and to elevate the mind.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Economist, Sep. 15, 2010