Serbian-born artist (1946- )
I didn't take no for an answer. I've always been like that. If I think in my gut that I'm right, I do it. You have to have this kind of conviction. Otherwise, I would have given up many years ago. After the 1970s, all the performance artists started doing paintings and sculptures or architecture; performing was far too hard. I'm so happy I didn't give up.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Life's Work: An Interview with Marina Abramovic", Harvard Business Review, November 2016
In every culture, [there are those] shamans or medicine men who endured incredible physical pain, because it's a door opening to the subconsciousness. And the way we can actually control the pain -- it's how to control everything. This is the key.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Guardian, May 12, 2014
When you get to my age of course you know you have to confront death. I want to die without anger, without fear and consciously, and these three things are not easy.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Marina Abramovic talks friends, enemies and fear", The Guardian, October 22, 2016
When you are a young artist, you have no idea what you are doing. Every artist who says he knows, it is a lie.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Marina Abramovic talks friends, enemies and fear", The Guardian, October 22, 2016
Don't even ask me why. I do not know, I have no answer to this insane behaviour.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Guardian, Oct. 2, 2010
What you're doing is not important. What is really important is the state of mind from which you do it. Performance.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
Walk Through Walls: A Memoir
When I was young it was impossible for me to talk to people. Now I can stand in front of three thousand people without any notes, any preconception of what I'm going to say, even without visual material, and I can look at everyone in the audience and talk for two hours easily. What happened? Art happened.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
Walk Through Walls: A Memoir
Every party is the same, too many people, too little food, and you have to wait around. I'm extremely bored with parties.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Marina Abramovic Makes Sundance Shut Up", Interview Magazine
For the first three months, I place each student at a table with a thousand pieces of white paper and a trash can underneath. Every day they have to sit at the table for several hours and write ideas. They put the ideas they like on the right side of the table; the ones they don't like, they put in the trash. But we don't throw out the trash. After three months, I only take the ideas from the trash can. I don't even look at the ideas they liked. Because the trash can is a treasure trove of things they're afraid to do.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
Walk Through Walls: A Memoir
I asked the director of the museum if he could make me a cake. He said, "Oh, you're so old-fashioned, you don't want any cake." But then, five minutes before midnight, he surprised me and made an entire me out of marzipan. Every scar that I cut during my performances, he made out of chocolate. There were four gorgeous guys carrying this, like a stretcher. And then people just cut me and ate me. Then the door opened again, and it was the director himself, completely naked, live, with a bow tie. This was incredible because there were some American collectors there who couldn't believe this. I mean, naked art director of a museum? This would have never happened in America.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Marina Abramovic Makes Sundance Shut Up", Interview Magazine
In a world of Communist drabness and deprivation, I lived in luxury. I never washed my own clothes. I never ironed. I never cooked. I never even had to clean my room. Everything was done for me. All that was asked of me was to study and be the best.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
Walk Through Walls: A Memoir
We are trapped in technology because we are so unbelievably impressed by technology ... Technology is not the problem, our approach to technology is the problem.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Guardian, December 7, 2015
If you experiment, you have to fail. By definition, experimenting means going to territory where you've never been, where failure is very possible. How can you know you're going to succeed? Having the courage to face the unknown is so important.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
Walk Through Walls: A Memoir
Talking about performance is such a strange thing because it's so immaterial. We are talking about soft matter. We are talking about something that is invisible. You can't see it. You can't touch it. You just can feel it.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Marina Abramovic Makes Sundance Shut Up", Interview Magazine
I'd always thought of art as something that was expressed through certain tools: painting, sculpture, photography, writing, film, music, architecture. And yes, performance. But this performance went beyond performance. This was life.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
Walk Through Walls: A Memoir
In the performer's body, you don't care how you look. It doesn't matter if you're old, fat, beautiful, or ugly. It doesn't change anything. The only thing is your charisma and how you express your idea.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Once Upon a Time", Harper's Bazaar, Feb. 7, 2012
People who love you start to hate you when you become that rock star. Everybody is scrutinizing. They want you to be poor, to suffer, to struggle. I could not pay my electricity bill until I was 50, and now I can. I think this is something I should not be criticized for.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Life's Work: An Interview with Marina Abramovic", Harvard Business Review, November 2016
The brother of my grandfather was the patriarch of the Orthodox Church and revered as a saint. So everything in my childhood is about total sacrifice, whether to religion or to communism. This is what is engraved on me. This is why I have this insane willpower. My body is now beginning to be falling apart, but I will do it to the end. I don't care. With me it is about whatever it takes.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
The Guardian, Oct. 2, 2010
He could not deliver the piece because he could not sit as long as I can, and the public divided us because they were talking about how I am stronger. It was terrible for our relationship because his punishment was being unfaithful.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Marina Abramovic talks friends, enemies and fear", The Guardian, October 22, 2016
I always thought the more fucked-up childhood you have, the better artist you get, because you have more material to work with. I don't think anyone does anything from happiness. Happiness is such a good state, it doesn't need to be creative.
MARINA ABRAMOVIC
"Marina Abramovic Makes Sundance Shut Up", Interview Magazine