I look for dancers who have all the technique in the world. But they must be dancers who are open-minded, who are willing to forget that they know anything. They also have to be gorgeous; they must have a clear image of themselves and strong personalities.

Twyla Tharp

Art is the only way to run away without leaving home.

Twyla Tharp

I see dance as glue for a community.

Twyla Tharp

Creativity is a habit, and the best creativity is the result of good work habits.

Twyla Tharp

I had always seen myself as a star; I wanted to be a galaxy.

Twyla Tharp

Ultimately there is no such thing as failure. There are lessons learned in different ways.

Twyla Tharp

In dreams, anything can be anything, and everybody can do. We can fly, we can turn upside down, we can transform into anything.

Twyla Tharp

You can only generate ideas when you put pencil to paper, brush to canvas... when you actually do something physical.

Twyla Tharp

Creativity is not just for artists. It's for businesspeople looking for a new way to close a sale; it's for engineers trying to solve a problem; it's for parents who want their children to see the world in more than one way.

Twyla Tharp

The only thing I fear more than change is no change. The business of being static makes me nuts.

Twyla Tharp

Dance is the most fundamental of all art forms.

Twyla Tharp

To survive, you've got to keep wheedling your way. You can't just sit there and fight against odds when it's not going to work. You have to turn a corner, dig a hole, go through a tunnel - and find a way to keep moving.

Twyla Tharp

Optimism with some experience behind it is much more energizing than plain old experience with a certain degree of cynicism.

Twyla Tharp

Nobody worked harder than Mozart. By the time he was twenty-eight years old, his hands were deformed because of all the hours he had spent practicing, performing, and gripping a quill pen to compose. That's the missing element in the popular portrait of Mozart.

Twyla Tharp

I would have to challenge the term, modern dance. I don't really use that term in relation to my work. I simply think of it as dancing. I think of it as moving.

Twyla Tharp

I always tell students that you've got to be practical. You do not need a dream. You need a purpose, something you can wake up to in the morning when the dream is dissipated.

Twyla Tharp

What we want from modern dance is courage and audacity.

Twyla Tharp

Proust writes, he remembers, physically. He depends on his body to give him the information that will bring him to the past. His book is called 'In Search of Lost Time,' and he does it through the senses. He does it through smell. He does it through feeling. He does it through texture. It is all physically driven, that language.

Twyla Tharp

There's this expression called postmodernism, which is kind of silly, and destroys a perfectly good word called modern, which now no longer means anything.

Twyla Tharp

My favorite audience is everybody. I worked in a drive-in theater from the time I was 8 years old until I went to college, and I'm accustomed to everybody can buy a ticket and everybody should be taken into account.

Twyla Tharp

Desire is the first thing a modern dancer should have. Skill can be developed. But if you don't have desire as a modern dancer, forget it.

Twyla Tharp