Lupe Fiasco Quotes

I'm not saying I wasn't flawed or amateurish. But you can never say I did anything to appease the music business.

The trouble with movies as a business is that it's an art, and the trouble with movies as art is that it's a business.

If you're an artist, it's great to have a knowledge of the business and be educated about that, but you've got to keep the balance right between business and artistry; otherwise, you get cynical.

When the business starts shaping the art, or the delivery of the art, then it's not right.

Real art has been... what's the word? Kidnapped? No, that's not it. But, OK, kidnapped by business.

I decided to do whatever I could to make sure the business side of music didn't intrude on the creative part.

We don't want to become like country artists where there's a formula.

To be honest, we never, ever let business weigh down the creativity of this band.

Rules limit you, and once you start thinking about what the audience wants or expects, it becomes a trap that a lot of artists fall into.

The ugliest spectacle is that of artists selling themselves. Art as a commodity is an ugly idea... The artist as businessman is uglier than the businessman as artist.

I will not allow anyone to take anything off my palette but if I do then within that, I can be creative.

Art is something to be proud of. Art is no compromise. As an actor, you're giving it up, you're at the mercy of so many other people.

You have to think outside the box. The world is changing every day, the music industry is so different but I think the more creative you are the better.

With my records, it's just a matter of trying to create something fresh for myself in a very finite context, which is the pop song. I don't know anything about the people who buy my records, and what, if anything, they get out of them.

Art is a concrete and personal and rather childish thing after all - no matter what people do to graft it into science and make it sociological and psychological; it is no good at all unless it is let alone to be itself - a game of make-believe, or re-production, very exciting and delightful to people who have an ear for it or an eye for it.

In order to create art today, you have to compromise your art somewhat and be a businessman.

I think, as the writer, you're always going to mourn something [left out of a film]. But you also just want to know there's a good reason for it being left out. On the whole, you want to give something to somebody creative. The worst thing you can do is say, "Here, be creative, but do it like I want you to do it." I was always very mindful of that.

We have access to more resources in general, and they are not going to force a situation on us, whether its the producer, or the cover, or what songs we have to play. And it's a small enough company that it seems like the people there care about music and not just about business.

A lot of people have that story that they used to sell crack or shoot people; that's nothing new. But honestly, if that was me, I probably still wouldn't be doing that because it's so many people that's doing that. It just gets old when you hear a million raps about how many ways I could shoot you. So I just try to be more creative and come with something new because I actually care about the music.

I don't have to worry about what people are thinking and what's going on in the industry. I don't want that stuff to influence what I'm doing. Because I think it stifles you creatively. I don't want to have to care too much about that. All I care about is what the fans think. It's really all I care about, honestly.

Artists are free to push boundaries to make art. But when pushing boundaries is their only aim, the result is usually bad art.

Just as the creative artist is not allowed to choose, neither is he permitted to turn his back on anything: a single refusal, and he is cast out of the state of grace and becomes sinful all the way through.

There is no purity with regards to the marketplace and art, I believe.

Art is vice. You don't marry it legitimately, you rape it.

Art is about freedom of expression, and should not be molded to fit any propaganda or lofty ideal.