“Who am I?, the artist asks. And he devotes his whole life to finding out.”

Dance constitutes a true recapturing of… freedom and childish play.

To make up a dance, I still need, as I needed then, a pot of tea, walking space, privacy and an idea.

We can’t stand silence, because silence includes thinking. And if we thought, we would have to face ourselves.

great artists can be uncertain. Of course they are while strugggling to find solutions.

I want one word on my tombstone – dancer.

The acrobat is lost in a web of muscles the dancer is all but invisible in projected idea.

Dancers don’t get invited to visit people. It is assumed a boy dancer will run off with the spoons and a girl with the head of the house.

I learned three important things in college-to use a library, to memorize quickly and visually, to drop asleep at any time given a horizontal surface and fifteen minutes.

So that we will miss nothing. Partly it’s greed, but mainly its curiosity. We just want to experience it. And we do.

Ballet technique never becomes easy, it becomes possible

But all of these knew very well what they did not want, and what they did not want was the current coin, the well-worn usage.

A good education is usually harmful to a dancer. A good calf is better than a good head.

One of the good things about my having some recognition is that I can do something for the people

We have the most varied and imaginative bathrooms in the world, we have kitchens with the most gimmicks, we have houses with every possible electrical gadget to save ourselves all kinds of trouble – all so that we can have leisure. Leisure, leisure, leisure!

When I dance I am really meditating rather then performing for an audience.

So that we don’t go mad in the leisure, we have color TV. So that there will never, never, be a moment of silence, we have radio and Muzak.

If you look at my eyes when I’m dancing, you’ll see that glazed look.

“I didn’t want her to miss tonight! I wanted to be able to tell her!” And to see all these people, a Hispanic cop dancing with an old white woman, wow! I mean, that’s the world I want to live in, and because it’s the world I want to live in, I had a hard time leaving.

I was always dancing and acrobatics was my specialty.

She had heard Papa sing so many songs about the heart; the heart that was breaking – was aching – was dancing -was heavy laden – that leaped for joy – that was heavy in sorrow – that turned over – that stood still. She really believed the heart actually did those things.

When I was probably 5 or 6, my mother put me into an acting, singing, and dancing class.

I’ve been dancing all my life, but I never did it seriously.

I was always into performing and dancing as a kid and acting was a safe place to have all my feelings, which is good as a child.

Dancing inspires my music. Having your girlfriends all together and just being free and happy.