Quotes & Sayings About Artistic Success

Something was happening while
you waited. The most essential thing was happening. And even if he himself was doing
nothing, it was happening through him nevertheless. He had done his best. He had
employed all his artistic skill. He had made not one single mistake. His performance had
been unique. It would be crowned with success ... He need only wait a few more hours. It
filled him with profound satisfaction, this waiting. He had never felt so fine in all his life,
so peaceful, so steady, so whole and at one with himself — Patrick Suskind

Fear goes hand-in-hand with artistic creation, and no amount of success will make the fear go away entirely. — Susan Elizabeth Phillips

There are two kinds of success. One is musical or artistic and the other is commercial. — John McLaughlin

Success is like a "Tawaif" Noble, Artistic, Rich, literate, full of etiquette and of course an addiction.. Yet never loyal to anyone.. You have to be a "deserving slave" to get her .. — Himmilicious

In the 'west' success is defined in purely material terms. He with the most money wins ... We should question, speak out and work for a better society with a whole different definition of what is deemed a successful artistic life. — Mark A. Brennan

We do not overidentify with our jobs. We may take pride in our work, we may stay late and come in on weekends, but we recognize that we are not our job descriptions. The amateur, on the other hand, overidentifies with his avocation, his artistic aspiration. He defines himself by it. He is a musician, a painter, a playwright. Resistance loves this. Resistance knows that the amateur composer will never write his symphony because he is overly invested in its success and overterrified of its failure. The amateur takes it so seriously it paralyzes him. — Steven Pressfield

For success I consider three factors are necessary: firstly, an awareness of my own strengths and weaknesses; secondly, an accurate understanding of my opponent's strengths and weaknesses; thirdly, a higher aim than momentary satisfaction. I see this aim as being scientific and artistic achievements, which place the game of chess on a par with other arts. — Alexander Alekhine

Freedom is essential to the pursuit of happiness.
Freedom is essential to artistic evolution and expression.
Freedom is essential to the expansion of the human mind.
Freedom is essential to the development and application of basic humanitarianism.
Freedom is essential to the creation of an individual's will, motivations, preferences, and unique talents.
In essence, freedom is essential to the success and progress of humanity. — Richelle E. Goodrich

He felt certain that he was a failure, every artistic endeavor ending with his own surprise at how little had come from it. Perhaps that was how life worked, the expectation of success after each failure the engine that kept the world turning. Perhaps retrogression was an artistic endeavor in itself. Perhaps he might sink so far that he would find himself, somehow, returned to the surface. — Kevin Wilson

The fewer limitations the artist imposes on his work, the less chance he has for artistic success. — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

We're not afraid of risking what was our success yesterday in order to explore some new field. We're adventurous. We like the challenge of unknown territory, unknown artistic field, and that's what stimulates us. — Guy Laliberte

The aesthetic construct, and nothing else, has taught us to expose ourselves to a non-enslaving experience of rank differences. The work of art is even allowed to 'tell' us, those who have run away from form, something, because it quite obviously does not embody the intention to confine us. 'La poesie ne s'impose plus, elle s'expose' Something that exposes itself and proves itself in this test gains unpresumed authority. In the space of aesthetic simulation, which is at once the emergency space for the success and failure of the artistic construct, the powerless superiority of the works can affect observers who otherwise take pains to ensure that they have no lord, old or new, above them. — Peter Sloterdijk

First-person narrators is the way I know how to write a book with the greatest power and chance of artistic success. — Anne Rice

The story of The Doors is one of the most compelling in the history of American rock music; three hugely talented musicians and a lead singer whose commitment to artistic freedom was so intense he rocketed them to a success that always hovered on the edge of chaos. As an independent filmmaker this sensibility affected me greatly. — Tom DiCillo

The artist ... standing in the position of mediator between the world of his experience and the world of his dreams - 'a mediator, consequently gifted with twin faculties, a selective faculty and a reproductive faculty.' To equate these faculties was the secret of artistic success. — James Joyce

Young people, don't get the idea that you have an artistic temperament which must be humored. Don't believe you cannot do good work unless you feel in tile mood for it. That is all nonsense. I frequently have to force myself to make a start in the morning; but after a short while I find I can work. Only hard and regular work will bring success. — Howard Pyle

You are the artistic painter of your success. Paint your life day-by-day, into a masterpiece of excellence over a lifetime. — Mark LaMoure

When I was 10, my parents really valued success in the arts, and I thought if I was a famous 'something artistic,' that they would love me more. — Sia Furler

WH Auden: "The first criterion of success in any human activity, the necessary preliminary, whether to scientific discovery or artistic vision, is intensity of attention or, less pompously, love. — ESPN Cricinfo

Male writers who never find the stabilizing force of an understanding woman in their lives usually end up as the jaded figures of their days, the types who give much artistic expression to the world, but who are lonely in their overcrowded worlds of love. — Janvier Chouteu-Chando

The struggle of the artist against the art-ideology, against the creative impulse and even against his own work also shows itself in his attitude towards success and fame; these two phenomena are but an extension, socially, of the process which began subjectively with the vocation and creation of the personal ego to be an artist. In this entire creative process, which begins with self-nomination as artist and ends in the fame of posterity, two fundamental tendencies - one might almost say, two personalities of the individual - are in continual conflict throughout: one wants to eternalize itself in artistic creation, the other in ordinary life - in brief, immortal man vs. the immortal soul of man. — Otto Rank

There is nothing harder for an Artist than to retain his Artistic integrity in the tomb of success. A tomb, nevertheless, which nearly every Artist: whether he admits it or not; naturally wants to get into. — Caitlin Thomas

It's harder to be a success, globally, and be artistic. Harder to have that balance than just to be artistic when nobody understands you. — Andre Benjamin

Silent evidence pervades everything connected to the notion of history. By history, I don't mean just those learned-but-dull books in the history section (with Renaissance paintings on their cover to attract buyers). History, I will repeat, is any succession of events seen with the effect of posteriority.
This bias extends to the ascription of factors in the success of ideas and religions, to the illusion of skill in many professions, to success in artistic occupations, to the nature versus nurture debate, to mistakes in using evidence in the court of law, to illusions about the "logic" of history
and of course, most severely, in our perception of the nature of extreme events. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

I wanted to give five solid years of being there all the time (with Sean). I hadn't seen my first son Julian grow up, and now there's a 17-year-old man on the phone talking about motorbikes. No matter what artistic gains I get, or gold records, if I can't make a success out of my relationship with the people I love, then everything else is bullsh*t. — John Lennon

Success is a completely abstract thing - it has no bearing on daily life, family matters, the matter of artistic creation, but it can affect grace, and if I lose that, I really have gained nothing from success. — Rachel Kushner

I earnestly advise women of artistic tastes to train for the unworked field of modern photography. It seems to be especially adapted to them, and the few who have entered it are meeting with gratifying and profitable success. (1898) — Gertrude Kasebier

I'm honestly not jealous of my wife at all - when she succeeds I'm psyched. It never occurred to me to feel threatened by her success. But the one thing I am jealous of is the number of awesome, interesting, artistic, productive, and cool people she gets to hang out with all day. — Christopher Noxon

Materialistic success can be explained quite simply. Those who succeed focus their attention on success - not on their talent. Remember these words! All of their efforts are focused toward the upward movement rather than the perfection of their artistic ability. Neither do they allow anyone to anything to stand in the way of reaching their goals. This includes wives, families, friends and their children. They are prepared to pay the very high price that success demands. — Brad Steiger

I heard from a swimming coach that how soon children learn to swim depends on how much they trust themselves and the surrounding world. I am convinced that this (self) confidence is the precondition of success in all intellectual activity. It may even have a greater role than believed in the least understood human talent: creativity, that is, artistic creation and scientific discovery. — Kato Lomb

Because IQ tests favor memory skills and logic, overlooking artistic creativity, insight, resiliency, emotional reserves, sensory gifts, and life experience, they can't really predict success, let alone satisfaction. — Diane Ackerman