Danny Gregory Quotes & Sayings

Sure, you need enormous amounts of technical expertise to be the best in the world. But to accomplish mindfulness, you just need something you already have: the willingness to quiet down, clear the crap and trust yourself. — Danny Gregory

bear in mind that interesting art doesn't come from trying to slavishly turn a photo into a drawing. Try to add as much as you can of your own to the image. — Danny Gregory

Skip perfection. A lame drawing is better than no drawing. — Danny Gregory

Remember: Writing is drawing. — Danny Gregory

Making art will show you how much you already have. Your real treasures. A brand-new Maserati is a lot less beautiful to draw than a rusty old pickup. — Danny Gregory

My drawing began as a way to count my blessings. To study, capture, catalog the things that, despite it all, make my life rich. — Danny Gregory

It's ironic that people speak of artists as dreamers. I think they are the most grounded people around. Conscious and present. As an artist, you really see life, connect with its beauty, and create something that shares those observations with others. You notice things. — Danny Gregory

An artist is someone who sees and feels realty very intensely. Creativity doesn't mean just making things up out of thin air. It means seeing and feeling the world so vividly that you can put together connections and patterns that help to explain reality. It means you see the beauty in the world rather than trying to hide from it. — Danny Gregory

creativity isn't a luxury. It's the essence of life. It's what distinguishes us from the mush. And it's why our ancestors survived while other less adaptive critters perished. They responded to change by being creative in some way, by inventing a new answer to the chaos. — Danny Gregory

Every day contains a thousand little servings of free time you might just have overlooked. And each moment contains beauty, wonder, and models you never need to pay. — Danny Gregory

Travel opens different eyes to different things, shows things we've never seen before, shows the world from entirely different angles. That's the power of drawing and the power of travel. They both make the familiar unfamiliar and vice versa. They show what we all have in common and what we may have missed thanks to preconceptions that may have marred our vision. — Danny Gregory

Contour, negative space, and measurements. You just learned the three important lessons in drawing and saved yourself four years of art school. — Danny Gregory

The true purpose of illustrated journaling [is] to celebrate your life. No matter how small or mundane or redundant, each drawing and little essay you write to commemorate an event or an object or a place makes it all the more special. — Danny Gregory

Please DO waste art materials. Use paper. Empty paint jars. Deplete pens. if it's teaching you stuff, it's not being wasted. — Danny Gregory

Art with a big "A" is for museums, galleries, critics, and collectors. art with a small "a" is for the rest of us. Art is a business, an industry, a racket. art is about passion, love, life, humanity - everything that is truly valuable. Art is sold, resold, put under the gavel, and insured up the wazoo. art with a small "a" is not a product. It's a point of view. It's a way of life. Art is made by trained professionals and experts. art is made by accountants, farmers, and stay-at-home moms at restaurant tables, in parking lots, and laundry rooms. Art takes Art School and Talent and years of Suffering and Sacrifice. art just takes desire and 15 minutes a day. You may not be an Artist. Big whoop. But I know you can make art - with a wonderful, expressive, teeny, tiny a. — Danny Gregory

Keep your eyes on the things you are drawing 80 percent of the time and on your page just 20 percent. — Danny Gregory

Get used to eating cold toast. Draw your breakfast every day. Then eat it. — Danny Gregory

This day is full of extraordinary things that you are missing. Wonderful sights, like the sun on your counterpane, the hairs on your cat's tail, the cracks in the paint on your radiator, the leaves piling up against the curve. Wonderful smells, wonderful sounds. Wonderful people. Wonderful opportunities. Today is wonderful. But perhaps you have lost your sense of wonder. — Danny Gregory

Birds sing, wolves howl, crickets chirp. But why? Money? Fame? Record contracts? Endorsements? What's it all for? They do it because they're alive. They do it because life is about making things. — Danny Gregory

Follow your passion and the rest will straighten itself out. — Danny Gregory

Read this book when you are stuck. But don't read it instead of drawing. — Danny Gregory

Mistakes are lessons in disguise and accurate reflections of your true state. Maybe you need to slow down. Maybe your initial expectation was actually what was wrong. Maybe you need to draw more often. — Danny Gregory

There are no bad drawings.
Drawings are experiences.
The more you draw, the more experienced you'll get.
In fact, you'll learn more from bad or unpredictable or weird experiences than from those that go exactly as you'd hoped and planned.
So let it go.
Release your ego's desire for perfection.
Take risks.
Stretch.
Grow.
Create as much as you can, whenever you can. — Danny Gregory

Don't go crazy with art supplies at first. Just get a sketchbook and a pen that'll fit in your bag and keep them with you for when a moment opens up. — Danny Gregory

Every day matters. I think so. I do. But I really have to work to force myself to see its value sometimes. — Danny Gregory

Celebrate your life now, as it unfolds.
Turn away from judgement and negative theories about your worth, your potential, and your destiny. See what you already have. — Danny Gregory

They record thoughts and overheard conversations, as well as maps of their personal paths, phone numbers for hotels, restaurant recommendations, airline flight numbers. Eventually, — Danny Gregory

look before you draw and believe what your eyes, not the rest of your head, tell you. — Danny Gregory