I'm interested in making art that is available to everybody.
I'm a kid from New York, so urban life reflected into art and music was around me and accessible and tangible.
There's something about approaching universal truths with the simplicity of the acoustic guitar. You can take it anywhere, and it helps me reach listeners of all ages and walks of life.
So much of my career has been about saying things the way people say them, using melodies not that I can sing but that the people can sing.
I think of art as coming from daily life, daily experience. I think it's very important not to have it become work for some kind of elite circle.
What I want is not to become a status symbol, but to give beauty at a price.
If Kanye was not in the equation, I literally wouldn't even be here. His music pushed hip-hop - the man is a master at taking a complex idea and presenting it in a way that is accessible for everyone.
I'm interested in putting something on stage that will have a very wide appeal without being condescending; that will reach an audience and make it part of the dance; that will get everybody in the theater.
Art should be created for life, not for the museum.
Some people act as though art that is for a mass audience is not good art, and I think this has been a very negative thing. I know that I have wanted very much to write books that are accessible to the widest audience possible.
So the recordings were these immersive landscapes, and yet, unlike the performances that almost no one would see, I had a sense that these could live forever. I was just starting to get my head around the democratic aspect of art; I didn't want to make rarefied things that were either alienatingly obscure or elite and art-worldy, so a recording that anyone could buy was a great medium.
My definition of art has always been the same. It is about freedom of expression, a new way of communication. It is never about exhibiting in museums or about hanging it on the wall. Art should live in the heart of the people. Ordinary people should have the same ability to understand art as anybody else. I don’t think art is elite or mysterious. I don’t think anybody can separate art from politics. The intention to separate art from politics is itself a very political intention.
Norman Rockwell - even though we think of him as a great American artist, in a lot of museums he has not garnered that kind of attention. And it's this kind of accessibility that we're trying to bring - not looking down on any art.
Whenever I am embraced by land and seascape I draw ideas for new sculptures; new forms to touch and walk around, new people to embrace, with an exactitude of form that those without sight can hold and realize... ...It is essentially practical and passionate.
I think my poems are slightly underrated by the word 'accessible.'
I didn't want to make 'high' art, I had no interest in using paint, I wanted to find something that anyone could relate to without knowing about contemporary art. I wasn't thinking in terms of precious prints or archival quality; I didn't want the work to seem like a commodity.
I want to put out music that everyday people can relate to.
’The Art of the Brick’ exhibition is accessible because it engages the child in all of us while simultaneously illuminating sophisticated and complex concepts. Everyone can relate to the medium since it is a toy that many children have at home. But my goal with this exhibition when it first debuted in 2007 was to elevate this simple plaything to a place it has never been before.
For one thing, I don't think art needs to be about suffering; sometimes it really seems like it's only the art about pain that is interpreted as profound, and in my work for years I've really tried to deal with subjects that are substantial, not just fluffy, but presented in a more playful, approachable kind of way.
Ever since I've ever heard music, I thought it should be very clean, very precise - as clean as possible, anyway, and more or less tuned to people. Something they could understand, something that was beautiful, you know?
I taught myself how to draw, and I soon found out it was what I really wanted to do. I didn't think I was going to create any great masterpieces like Rembrandt or Gauguin. I thought comics was a common form of art, and strictly American in my estimation, because America was the home of the common man - and show me the common man that can't do a comic. So comics is an American form of art that anyone can do with a pencil and paper.
I pretty much made a conscious decision to make projects a lot of people can relate to.
I like art with a sense of humor. I don't have a huge art education to understand everything. I don't think that means that art has to be watered down to the lowest common denominator, though. I don't think you have to go to college to be able appreciate great art, but I like art that doesn't take itself too seriously.
I found that a lot of people ridiculed contemporary art. I decided I wanted to be involved in art everybody could understand.
A musical, in its true form, is where emotions reach a height where true spoken word cannot be enough, and you must sing. That's all it is. It's not posh; it's not out of your reach. It's the most visceral way to tell a story.
