The reason dance has held such an ageless magic for the world is that it has been the symbol of the performance of living.
MARTHA GRAHAMThe reason dance has held such an ageless magic for the world is that it has been the symbol of the performance of living.
MARTHA GRAHAMWhat people in the world think of you is really none of your business.
MARTHA GRAHAMRepetition not for monotony but the ecstasy it induces.
MARTHA GRAHAMPeople have asked me why I chose to be a dancer. I did not choose. I was chosen to be a dancer, and with that, you live all your life.
MARTHA GRAHAMYou have no right to go before a public without an adequate technique, just because you feel. Anything feels – a leaf feels, a storm feels – what right have you to do that? You have to have speech, and it’s a cultivated speech.
MARTHA GRAHAMI believe that we learn by practice… it is the performance of a dedicated precise set of acts, physical or intellectual, from which come shape of achievement, a sense of one’s being, a satisfaction of spirit.
MARTHA GRAHAMI use the words gods and goddesses principally, I think, to mean beautiful bodies – bodies that are absolute instruments. And I believe in discipline, I believe in a very definite technique.
MARTHA GRAHAMI did not choose to be a dancer. I was chosen.
MARTHA GRAHAMDance is the hidden language of the soul, of the body.
MARTHA GRAHAMYou will only get out of a dance class what you bring to it. Learn by practice.
MARTHA GRAHAMStand up! Keep your backs straight! Remember that this is where the wings grow.
MARTHA GRAHAMI am certain that movement never lies. There is only one law of posture I have been able to discover – the perpendicular line connecting heaven and earth.
MARTHA GRAHAMThe past is not dead; it is not even past. People live on inner time; the moment in which a decisive thought or feeling takes place can be at any time. Timeless feelings are common to all of us.
MARTHA GRAHAMThe gesture is the thing truly expressive of the individual – as we think so will we act.
MARTHA GRAHAMMy childhood years were a balance of dark and light.
MARTHA GRAHAMNobody cares if you can’t dance well. Just get up and dance. Great dancers are great because of their passion.
MARTHA GRAHAM