I don't dare postulate about science, but I know that it takes both emotion and intellect in order for art to happen.

Yes, influences are enriching, and they can be found in every work of art, even the most original.

Personality is essential. It is in every work of art. When someone walks on stage for a performance and has charisma, everyone is convinced that he has personality. I find that charisma is merely a form of showmanship. Movie stars usually have it. A politician has to have it.

Nature generally struggles against this treatment for a while, until her powers seem in a great measure exhausted, when she quietly yields to the power of the art.

The work of art assumes the existence of the perfect spectator, and is indifferent to the fact that no such person exists.

The sadness of the incomplete, the sadness that is often Life, but should never be Art.

To make us feel small in the right way is a function of art; men can only make us feel small in the wrong way.

History develops, art stands still.

Works of art, in my opinion, are the only objects in the material universe to possess internal order, and that is why, though I don't believe that only art matters, I do believe in Art for Art's sake.

I was truly ignorant about art before the film.

Which implies that the real issue in art is the audience's response. Now I claim that when I make things, I don't care about the audience's response, I'm making them for myself. But I'm making them for myself as audience, because I want to wake myself up.

There is no work of art that has ever been made that is absolutely truthful about life.

One does not devote one's life in art to shock an audience.

Anybody can direct a picture once they know the fundamentals. Directing is not a mystery, it's not an art. The main thing about directing is: photograph the people's eyes.

Diversity: the art of thinking independently together.