“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.” BelieveImportantStoriesI BelieveAudienceShapesPerformancesPerformersLife Story Author:Marina Abramovic
“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.” FeelsMatterTalkingStrangePerformancesInvisibleStrange Things Author:Marina Abramovic
“First of all, to do performance art, you really have to give 100 percent. I only know that I have to give 100 percent and then what happens, happens.” KnowsGivingFirstsArtHappensPercentPerformancesPerformance ArtGive 100 Percent Author:Marina Abramovic
“Performance has to be mainstream art. This is what I'm fighting for.” ArtFightingPerformancesMainstream Author:Marina Abramovic
“You see, what is my purpose of performance artist is to stage certain difficulties and stage the fear the primordial fear of pain, of dying, all of which we have in our lives, and then stage them in front of audience and go through them and tell the audience, I'm your mirror; if I can do this in my life, you can do it in yours.” IfsI CanPainPurposeArtistCertainCan DoAudienceOur LivesStageDyingFrontsPerformancesDifficultyMirrorsYou Can Do ItI Can Do This Author:Marina Abramovic
“Documentation is misleading, because the performance is dead. So the very early works were not documented at all.” PerformancesMisleadDocumentationEarly Work Author:Marina Abramovic
“When I did "Seven Easy Pieces," I actually re-performed the performances of other artists. It was such difficult work because I had to really go through the documentation, look through the sources, to ask the witnesses who saw it.” LooksArtistAsksEasyDifficultSawsPiecesSourcePerformancesSevenWitnessDocumentationDifficult Work Author:Marina Abramovic
“You know the movie "Rashomon" from [Takeshi] Kurosawa, when all the people in the forest see something different? Each performance was like that.” PeopleKnowsDifferentPerformancesForestsKurosawa Author:Marina Abramovic
“When I first had a video camera to document a performance, it was in Sweden and I remember it was really crucial for me.” FirstsRememberPerformancesCamerasVideoCrucialDocumentsSwedenVideo Cameras Author:Marina Abramovic
“Zooming in, zooming out. I was shocked. I said, "Let's erase this right now, put the camera behind the stage and I'll do the performance just for the camera." He set up everything and I told him to go outside and smoke a cigarette. Come back when I finish. Don't touch the camera. This was the way how I've done most everything after that.” WaySaidDoneBehindsStageRight NowPerformancesCamerasSmokeCigaretteShockedEraseBack When Author:Marina Abramovic
“Typically, the performance has a story - a beginning, the crescendo and the end.” EndsStoriesPerformancesCrescendo Author:Marina Abramovic
“Through performance, I found the possibility of establishing a dialogue with the audience through an exchange of energy, which tended to transform the energy itself. I could not produce a single work without the presence of the audience, because the audience gave me the energy to be able, through a specific action, to assimilate it and return it, to create a genuine field of energy.” AbleActionFoundEnergyAudienceFieldsPossibilityProduceReturnPerformancesGenuineDialogue Author:Marina Abramovic
“Theatre is fake... The knife is not real, the blood is not real, and the emotions are not real. Performance is just the opposite: the knife is real, the blood is real, and the emotions are real.” RealEmotionBloodOppositesPerformancesTheatreFakeKnives Author:Marina Abramovic
“I believe so much in the power of performance I don't want to convince people. I want them to experience it and come away convinced on their own.” PeopleWantBelieveI BelievePerformancesConvincedConvince Author:Marina Abramovic
“I am pure performance, and Robert Wilson is pure theater.” PurePerformancesTheaterWilson Author:Marina Abramovic
“A powerful performance will transform everyone in the room.” RoomsPowerfulPerformances Author:Marina Abramovic
“I didn't get paid for performances most of my life. If I did, I would be billionaire now, and I'm not.” IfsWould BePerformancesPaidBillionaire Author:Marina Abramovic
“From the very early stage when I started doing performance art in the '70s, the general attitude - not just me, but also my colleagues - was that there should not be any documentation, that the performance itself is artwork and there should be no documentation.” ShouldArtAttitudeStagePerformancesColleaguesArtworkDocumentationPerformance Art Author:Marina Abramovic
