Agnes George de Mille (September 18, 1905 – October 7, 1993) was an American dancer and choreographer.
When I dance I am really meditating rather then performing for an audience. I am completely absorbed by the music and the steps I choose to respond to the music.
Ballet technique never becomes easy, it becomes possible
The practice mirror is to be used for the correction of faults, not for a love affair, and the figure you watch should not become your dearest friend.
We can't stand the silence because silence includes thinking. And if we thought, we would have to face ourselves.
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. What I could not learn was to think creatively on schedule.
Dance in the body you have.
To make up a dance, I still need, as I needed then, a pot of tea, walking space, privacy and an idea.
The choreographic process is exhausting. It happens on one's feet after hours of work, and the energy required is roughly the equivalent of writing a novel and winning a tennis match simultaneously.
Toe dancing is a dandy attention getter, second only to screaming.
No white man uses his feet the way an Indian does. He talks to the earth.
Living is a form of not being sure, not knowing what next or how. The moment you know how, you begin to die a little. The artist never entirely knows. We guess. We may be wrong, but we take leap after leap in the dark.
No trumpets sound when the important decisions of our life are made. Destiny is made known silently.
The universe lies before you on the floor, in the air, in the mysterious bodies of your dancers, in your mind. From this voyage no one returns poor or weary.
The creative urge is the demon that will not accept anything second rate.
If you want to understand a nation, look at its dances and listen to its folk songs - don't pay any attention to its politicians.
Find the passion. It takes great passion and great energy to do anything creative. I would go so far as to say you can't do it without that passion.
A good education is usually harmful to a dancer. A good calf is better than a good head.
My heroines are part of me and my heroes are part of what I'd like to know.
Friends die one by one, but so, thank God, do enemies.
I studied the way I danced- to the point of dropping.