Minimalist Quotes & Sayings

Beautiful and minimalist, the traditional Japanese art of ikebana - arranging bouquets of cut flowers and leaves using very few elements - ideally corresponded to a form of expression I could transpose in a perfume. The smell of a rose early in the morning, damp, sprinkled with dew, delicate and light. — Jean-Claude Ellena

The minimalist life. Pleasure is an egg. Blessings that can be counted, on the fingers of one hand. But possibly this is how I am expected to react. If I have an egg, what more can I want? In — Margaret Atwood

It looks like you can write a minimalist piece without much bleeding. And you can. But not a good one. — David Foster Wallace

In the long run, success or failure will be
conditioned upon the way in which the average man, the average women, does his or her duty, first in the ordinary, every-day affairs of life, and next in those great occasional cries which call for heroic virtues. The average citizen must be a good citizen if our republics are to succeed. The stream will not permanently rise higher than the main source; and the main source of national power and national greatness is found in the average citizenship of the nation. — Theodore Roosevelt

I'm quite a physical person and I gesticulate a lot, which can be a problem when you're in Hollywood and they do everything in a minimalist way ... — Gemma Arterton

I like sparseness. There's something about that minimalist feel that can make something have an immediate impact and make it unique. I'll probably always work with that formula; I just don't know how. — Britt Daniel

I'm not a minimalist, as I'm sure you've noticed. — Iris Apfel

I think Calvin [Klein] is a minimalist. — Donna Karan

I'll never be a minimalist. The fact that the prose is more tightly controlled doesn't for a minute mean that it's minimalist. I very much like arcane words and baroque sentence structure. — China Mieville

I always have separated myself from my critiques of collections. My judgment is not about whether I would wear it - but how the collection stands in the lexicon of an established designer. As I am a maximalist, not a minimalist, I don't wear Armani or Celine - but I so appreciate what they have achieved. — Suzy Menkes

'The Beatles' did whatever they wanted. They were a collection of influences adapted to songs they wanted to write. George Harrison was instrumental in bringing in Indian music. Paul McCartney was a huge Little Richard fan. John Lennon was into minimalist aggressive rock. — Chris Cornell

This makes it much easier to institute radical departures in public policy. In complex or divided societies, the chances are that a minority - or even a majority - will be forced to concede, often against its will. This makes collective policymaking contentious and favors a minimalist approach to social reform: better to do nothing than to divide people for and against a controversial project. — Tony Judt

Kingsley Amis was a lenient father. His paternal style, in the early years, can best be described as amiably minimalist - in other words, my mother did it all. — Martin Amis

Hema thought of Shiva, her personal deity, and how the only sensible response to the madness of life ... was to cultivate a kind of madness within, to perform the mad dance of Shiva, ... to rock and sway and flap six arms and six legs to an inner tune. Hema moved gently ... she danced as if her minimalist gestures were shorthand for a much larger, fuller, reckless dance, one that held the whole world together, kept it from extinction. — Abraham Verghese

I like people who are minimalist with their words. Jack Nicholson thinks a lot then says something, and it's always spot on. Nelson Mandela is the same. — David A. Stewart

I'm a minimalist Jew, but on Friday night, I celebrate Shabbat. At sundown, we light candles, say the blessing, and I don't turn on my computer for 24 hours. — Jill Soloway

We have a responsibility to give people opportunities to do what they can do. It's a fundamental tenet of democratic society. Libertarians who believe in a completely minimalist state, and don't feel we have that responsibility, are harming humanity. — Mitch Kapor

What makes Steve [Jobs'] methodology different from everyone else's is that he always believed the most important decisions you make are not the things you do, but the things you decide not to do. He's a minimalist. — John Sculley

I have personal issues with clutter. I, personally, am very minimalist and like a clean slate. I like to throw everything away. — Tempestt Bledsoe

This one Corbusier lamp was like, my greatest inspiration ... I'm a minimalist in a rapper's body. — Kanye West

In Jefferson's mind great historical leaps forward were almost always the product of a purging, which freed societies from the accumulated debris of the past and thereby allowed the previously obstructed natural forces to flow forward into the future. Simplicity and austerity, not equality or individualism, were the messages of his inaugural march. It was a minimalist statement about a purging of excess and a recovery of essence. — Joseph J. Ellis

Of course one's sense of identification with the nation is inflected by all kinds of particulars, including one's class, race, gender, and sexual identification. ... But [regarding] national character ... , aside from references to a national aesthetic - literary, musical, and choreographic, there are two poles I reference: minimalist and maximalist. I love them both - the cryptic poems of Emily Dickinson folded up in tiny packets and hidden away in a box, the sparse, understated choreographies of Merce; but also the "trashy, profane and obscene" poems of Whitman and Ginsberg, [and] Martha Graham's expressionism. I am, myself, a minimalist. But I love distortion guitar and the wild exhibitionism of so many American artists. Also, these divisions are false. Emily Dickinson, in fact, can be as trashy and obscene as the best of them! Anyway, Dickinson and Whitman are at the heart of this narrative. They are the Dancing Queen and the Guitar Hero. — Barbara Browning

To be able to impress, you have to get to this middle ground where you're not too advanced so it goes over people's heads, and you're not too minimalist where people think you're just trying to rob the game and not stretch out. — DJ Quik

When in doubt, I always, always buy clear vases. You really can't go wrong with minimalist clear vases, especially when you're sending someone flowers. The flowers are the star of the show and need to shine! — Khloe Kardashian

The concept of minimalism is to relax. Like a Zen monk in training, it is something that brings equilibrium to the heart. I don't necessarily think it has any problems, but if I were to force myself to name one, I would say that since the minimalist feeling already includes its own universe, I think it might kill the drive that we would otherwise have to commit the physically impossible and attempt to travel into outer space. — Takashi Murakami

I was lucky to be born during the time of minimalism. I think I can be colder because of this. In form I speak with minimalism but my feeling is sentimental - I am a sentimental minimalist. — Christian Boltanski

Neutrinos ... win the minimalist contest: zero charge, zero radius, and very possibly zero mass. — Leon M. Lederman

People constantly describe me as a formalist or even a minimalist, but I'm not really bothered with the rules of painting or the history of painting. My approach is that everything is mine. I take what I can use from wherever, and then I forget where I've taken it from. But there is no point me making anything that looks like anyone else's. — Gary Hume

The seven white notes on the piano - each section of the piece (there are 12 sections) is five of those seven white notes. If you calculate it, there are 21 groups of five notes in any group of seven notes. And although there are 12 sections, this piece actually uses nine of those groups because some of the sections repeat earlier ones. So that's the formula. It's very simple as a way of generating something. It's my inner minimalist. — Brian Eno

I am a minimalist. I like saying the most with the least. — Bob Newhart

The easiest way to be accused of being a hypocrite is to become a minimalist. No matter how much you have, you can always live with less. That makes minimalism easy to dismiss. It also means that you do not make the choice to become a minimalist once, but instead make it over and over again, slowly freeing yourself of more and more possessions. — Ashley Riordan

I've been called a minimalist composer for more than 30 years, and while I've never really agreed with the description, I've gotten used to it. — Philip Glass

'Dirtbag' is just the term we use, like a 'gnarly dude' in surfing. Within the climbing culture, it means being a committed lifer: someone who has embraced a minimalist ethic in order to rock climb. It basically means you're a homeless person by choice. — Alex Honnold

I've been accused of being a minimalist writer. I don't like a lot of verbiage in there. — Kathy Reichs

In reality, a minimalist is simply someone who tries to live simply. A minimalist is someone who doesn't want clutter in their homes or their lives, someone who makes an effort to keep their home simple, and someone who realizes that there is more to life than accumulating "stuff. — Beth Jones

My wife and I battle over home decor. My style goes from Gothic to Baroque. Hers is minimalist. — Joe Bastianich

Black and white is a very minimalist art form and unlike color photographs does not pretend to mimic the world in a manner similar to the way the human eye might perceive ...

Black and white is essentially an abstract way to interpret and transform what one might refer to as reality. — Roger Ballen

You can't be minimalist as a director until you have acquired the experience and confidence to say no. — Richard Eyre

Summer sticks to her skirt sumptuously, in the shiny gray fabric hanging loosely from her curves. Her chestnut eyes, apparently hidden from strangers; her simple but graceful face, unpainted by Madison Avenue; and her straight black hair, parted down the middle without ego, all suggest a minimalist - almost pastoral - beauty that is oddly discordant with her fashionable attire, comfortable indifference to the crowds, and quasi-attentive perusal of the Time magazine unfolded over her hand. — Zack Love

In general I don't like definitions, but 'Minimalist' is a term that means elegance and openness, so I would prefer to be called a Minimalist than something else. — Ludovico Einaudi

Minimalism is the constant art of editing your life. — Danny Dover

If I have ideas, I want to put them in the movie. It's not a minimalist approach at all but I feel like it's for the audience. It's about seeing how much texture we can give it and seeing how many things are there for people to latch on to ... I just want to do it the way I want and I feel like it won't be helpful for me if I start worrying about that. I just have to follow my instincts. Everyone is going to respond differently to it and everybody's right - that's their point of view. That's how the story intersects with their lives. — Wes Anderson

But that kind of falls in line; when you think about it, James Brown was a funk minimalist. All of those parts create a sum that's larger than than the individual parts. — Charlie Hunter

the Apple Stores' sleek minimalist design and close control over the consumer experience, the omnipresent advertising campaigns, the price positioning as a maker of premium goods, and the lingering nimbus of Steve Jobs's personal charisma all contribute to a perception that Apple offers products so good as to constitute a category of their own. — Peter Thiel

It's Twitter's combination of simplicity and complexity that is astonishing in the same way that minimalist sculpture was inspiring and enlightening. — Kenneth Goldsmith

Except among those whose education has been in the minimalist style, it is understood that hasty moral judgments about people in the past are a form of injustice. — Jacques Barzun

I'm more eclectic.Maybe I'm minimalist in the respect that I love black ... black for the winter, white for the summer, you know? But I love artisanal things. — Donna Karan

Paul's strong, clear teaching at exactly this point both on the new status of the believer as having died and risen with Jesus Christ and on the new gift of God to the believer, the gift which Paul calls the holy spirit. It is astonishing to see how much of the debate has been conducted without the help of these two categories, as though the 'doctrine of justification' had to proceed with minimalist theological tools in order to be pure. You might as well try to play Wagner on a tin whistle. — N. T. Wright

I'm a minimalist. I don't really need much to enjoy a good holiday - just my family and the bare essentials. — Jean Reno

In poetry we pare down our thoughts into their most graceful shapes, like minimalist sculptures. — Patricia Robin Woodruff

I want to get lean and mean, keep it minimalist. — John Cale

I'm a minimalist. I like things to look very clean, I like clean lines. I like everything to be tidy and have space. — Sebastian Clovis

I never feel that my music is sparse or minimalist; the way fat people never really think they're fat. I certainly don't consider myself minimalist at all. — Morton Feldman

Minimalism is the new extra mile. — Mokokoma Mokhonoana

Gertrude Stein, all courage and will, is a soldier of minimalism. Her work, unlike the resonating silences in the art of Samuel Beckett, embodies in its loquacity and verbosity the curious paradox of the minimalist form. This art of the nuance in repetition and placement she shares with the orchestral compositions of Philip Glass. — Elizabeth Hardwick

I love playing instruments that I don't know how to play or am not familiar with. I like the idea of danger and innocence that comes from it. As an artist, I feel I should be able to do something with anything I get my hands on. The music becomes minimalist because of my limited knowledge. — Gustavo Santaolalla

It is easy to be inspired by history when you're living in a part of it and allow that to seep into your writing: having said that, a minimalist room with no distractions is often better; the most exciting visions should already be in your head. — Simon Toyne

I love a strong brow and ChapStick with glowing skin and messy hair. I'm a minimalist at heart. — Ariana Madix

Glamour is back, but with a minimalist touch. — Gianni Versace

But I like sleepy. I like nothing-ever-happens. I buy the same chocolate bar from the same shop every day, next to our village pond with its minimalist duck population of three, and then I check the Holksea village newsletter with no news in it. It's comforting. I can wrap my whole life up in a blanket. — Harriet Reuter Hapgood

The leaders of thought and of action grope their
way forward to a new life, realizing, sometimes dimly, sometimes clear-sightedly,
that the life of material gain, whether for a nation or an individual, is of value
only as a foundation, only as there is added to it the uplift that comes from
devotion to loftier ideals. — Theodore Roosevelt

The purpose of minimalist living is to get us to a point where every single thing we have in our homes is something that brings us ongoing joy or provides usefulness regularly. — Genevieve Parker Hill

My writing became more and more minimalist. In the end, I couldn't write at all. For seven or eight years, I hardly wrote. But then I had a revelation. What if I did the opposite? What if, when a sentence or a scene was bad, I expanded it, and poured in more and more? After I started to do that, I became free in my writing. — Karl Ove Knausgaard

Each season I strive to design a forward-thinking and effortless collection with a very clean minimalist aesthetic. — Francisco Costa

I'm a minimalist at heart. If a song doesn't need a solo, I'm not going to force one into it. — The Edge

Most films and directors lose their nerve and want to indicate [emotions] a bit more, to show that their story is clear. I'm not saying that's a good thing; as an actor its anathema to good acting, but to have someone with the confidence to say that should I be utterly natural and minimalist is great. — Matt Damon

I knew I could never be accepted as a straight-ahead jazz musician, nor would Iaccept myself as that. I would never be accepted as a minimalist. I wouldn't be adowntown composer. Because I find all orthodoxies, all doctrines to be ultimatelybanal. — Anthony Davis

There is a payoff for examining the divine author's literary style. It will tell you something about Him. Whereas, Jonah's actions are extensively described and laboriously detailed, God's reactions (although miraculous) are only described in sparse, minimalist terms.
God seems much more amused by Jonah than Jonah is with God. Every miracle is directed at Jonah. Yet, very little copy is used to described God's miracles. Although God's miracles are much more astonishing than Jonah's immature fits of rebellion, more copy is dedicated to Jonah. — Michael Ben Zehabe

I am a worried person with a stressed out soul, living a simple life with no capital. — Charlotte Eriksson

It is already apparent that the 'minimalist' view of the Bible as wholly fictitious and unhooked from historical reality, may be as much of a mistake as the biblical literalism it sought to supersede. — Simon Schama

A minimalist does not charge you for what he did. He charges you for what he did not do. — Mokokoma Mokhonoana

Rome is a city where in every corner you have a reminder of the sacred world. That's why I have sacred music, minimalist sacred music, which is also music I like, because at the end of the day, that's what I want to do. — Paolo Sorrentino

I was pretty much a minimalist. I liked a lot of black at the time, which is very different from my wardrobe now, because I live in color. — Roopal Patel

I've been a minimalist my whole life, even if you wouldn't know it from my office. — Neil DeGrasse Tyson

He was heartbroken, I say.

Heartbroken, he repeats. Of course. That's the great myth Edward Monkford's spun around himself, isn't it? The tormented genius who lost the love of his life and became an arch-minimalist as a result.

You don't think that's right?

I know it isn't. — J.P. Delaney

I would love, more than anything, to do an out-and-out farce with huge physical energy. Just because you're from the minimalist school, it doesn't mean you can't go big. — Aidan Quinn

Why not take a science fiction comic and put the characters in a small town to gain their particular perspective? A lot of that comes from me growing up in a small town on a farm, so that's what I know and what I'm comfortable with. My drawing style is also very sparse and minimalist, so a rural setting complements that. — Jeff Lemire

I really do think of them as post-minimalist sculptures, inspired in large part by some very early spacecraft that NASA built. — Trevor Paglen

I always liked the visuals to be choice and at the same time minimalist. And, I love black boxes. After all, that's what theatre is, it's an empty space, and it's both limited and unlimited because the space is the space, but what you can do with people's imaginations is really endless. — Harold Prince

KISS: Keep it smart = simple. — Selim Tolga

As for futuristic costumes, I loved doing 'Gattaca' because I'm a minimalist at heart, and it's a very minimal film. Plus, with Uma Thurman, Ethan Hawke and Jude Law, how could you go wrong? — Colleen Atwood

I've always been the king of silence. I've always been a minimalist comedian. I've taken my influence from Jack Benny, who was the king of that ... I've always done 'less is more.' — Albert Brooks

There's a big default notion that "spare," or "precise" prose is somehow better. I keep insisting to them that while such prose is completely legitimate, it's in no way intrinsically more accurate, more relevant, or better than lush prose. That adjective "precise," for example, needs unpicking. If a "minimalist" writer describes a table, and a metaphor-ridden adjective-heavy weird fictioneer describes a table, they are very different, but the former is in absolutely no way closer to the material reality than the latter. Both of them are radically different from that reality. They're just words. A table is a big wooden thing with my tea on it. — China Mieville

When I say that there's commonality, I mean more in terms of the sort of techniques by which we perceive Baroque and minimalist music rather than the techniques used to compose them. I know that's being sort of overly complicated. — Mahan Esfahani

I like Modernism. I grew up around these sort of eclectic, heavily carved, baroque, rococo, highly ornamented styles that were in my life from the time that I was a child until now in my business life. So I like clean, straight, minimalist lines. — Paul Brown

When you give your items away, don't keep the excess of your pride. — Bremer Acosta

It's meant to reaffirm the validity of that music - clean, minimalist, honest, classic music. — Dwight Yoakam

He's an avant-gardener whose great work includes the famous minimalist garden at Kew which was just a daisy and three wittily arranged grass stems. — Ben Moor

As far as accessories are concerned, I think it is always best to be as minimalist as possible. — Alice Temperley

The minimalist path is not about getting rid of everything and owning nothing, it is about living an integrated life in which everything has meaning and value because it is about your way of being. — Ela Garrison

Derailed. In exile. Deeply ashamed, despised. Yet she had so little pride, she was grateful most days simply to be alive.
There is Minimalist art; there are minimalist lives. — Joyce Carol Oates

I'm a minimalist in a rapper's body. — Kanye West

Sometimes guitar riffs get repeated over and over ("vamping," in the lingo of musicians), but generally there is a soloist proving variation that runs above that background, lest the song sound monotonous. Philip Glass's minimalist compositions (such as the soundtrack to 'Koyaanisqatsi') deviate from much of the classical music that preceded them, with much less obvious movement than, say, the Romantic-era compositions that his work seems to rebel against, yet his works, too, consist not only of extensive repetition but also of constant (though subtle) variation. Virtually every song you've ever heard consists of exactly that: themes that recur over and over, overlaid with variations. — Gary F. Marcus

I want to change things with everything I do, not for the sake of changing things, but for the sake of taking greater and greater risks, or how minimalist I might be able to be, or how I can involve elements or ingredients in music videos that are not musical, for instance. — Jonathan Glazer

I'm a minimalist. I see things in simple ways ... It's human nature to define complexity as better. Well, it's not. — Gordon Willis