Best 154 quotes of Jack White on MyQuotes

Onstage, I don't feel any glory from people clapping in the audience, but when they're pushing me to do something new that feels good.

Passion, for me, is like a shark - it never stops moving.

Passion is the breath we take, the water we drink to sustain ourselves. Without air and water we perish; without passion an artist will wither and blow away.

People have sort of a problem trying to see an end to a situation as being positive or romantic.

People talk about wanting amenities - downtown is the amenity.

Playing drums feels like coming home for me. Even during the White Stripes I thought: 'I'll do this for now, but I'm really a drummer.' That's what I'll put on my passport application.

Promotion and perception are synonymous twins of art marketing.

Punk is an attitude, not a genre, age group, or time period. What's interesting is trying to define the blues and punk in different ways. They are very close cousins.

Selling is nothing more than asking questions and waiting for an answer.

Smart art galleries know it's not the words on paper but the emotion in the piece that makes clients pull out the credit card or check book. The gallery's number one concern is will this stuff sell? What your bio, artist's statement or resume articulates will be of no help if you don't make art that connects with buyers.

Some guys are afraid of "fashion" even those this isn't really fashion. It's more "style". A lot of guys don't want to look like they care too much. The idea of standing in a fiting room and trying things on and saying, "How does this look?" I think maybe that experience is a little bit intimidating.

Some people consider the way Shakespeare was writing about Ophelia as erotomania-that she was delusional in thinking that Hamlet was in love with her. But I don't think so.

Sometimes you just get in there and force yourself to work, and maybe something good will come out, ya know? Deadlines and things make you creative. Opportunity and telling yourself you have all the time in the world, all the money in the world, all the colors in the palette, anything you want-that just kills creativity.

Success is having a career that you love with every fiber in your body.

Technology is a big destroyer of emotion and truth. Auto-tuning doesn’t do anything for creativity. Yeah, it makes it easier and you can get home sooner; but it doesn’t make you a more creative person. That’s the disease we have to fight in any creative field: ease of use.

Telling yourself you have all the time in the world, all the colors in the palette, that just kills creativity.

That's what happens nowadays with people working on computers. They can so easily fix things with their mouse and take out all the, 'Oh, somebody coughed in the background; we need to take that out' - or somebody hit a bad note. Those are all the best moments.

The biggest failures come round and spring ultimate surprises of survival.

The big picture is a nice way to think of things if you have the freedom to.

The Bottom Line: If people don't LOVE our work, we will not be able to sell what we make.

The bottom line is we must get off our duff and make an effort to succeed. Trust me on this, when you see someone successful in any of the arts they have been willing to make an extra effort.

The Eagle does not escape the storm. The Eagle simply uses the storm to lift it higher. It spreads its mighty wings and rises on the winds that bring the storm.

The main things to rebel against - over-production, too much technology, overthinking. It's a spoiled mentality; everything is too easy. If you want to record a song, you can buy Pro Tools and record four hundred guitar tracks. That leads to overthinking, which kills any spontaneity and the humanity of the performance.

The most exciting rock 'n' roll band of the last 50 years who are still on the road today

The only person who is hurt by jealousy is you... Eliminate that word from your life... it may not make you unsuccessful selling your art, but it will destroy your happiness.

The price we sell things for is not important. What is important is we sell art that has to be replaced. You become good in art by doing art. The more you sell, the more you must produce.

There are distractions, all around. There's so much media, for a young kid to battle against, to get to something soulful. You have to make a decision, on your own, what you can take from these people, if you can dig deeper. It's nice to be able to let people dig deeper.

There have been three times. Once I got in a car accident and shattered my finger. A few years ago I didn't feel like being alive. That's all I can say.

There's Catholic guilt about things, then there's the guilt of being the youngest of 10, so when nice things happen to you, you're not really allowed to enjoy them.

The secret is planning your work and working your plan. If you don't know where you are going, how will you know when you arrive? You can't stumble upon your destination.

The secret of a successful art career is to make more art that folks think they need than pieces they just want. When a piece of art emotionally connects with a person the work becomes a need. You are then on your way to becoming successful.

The true professional makes art when he is not feeling good, if the studio is too cold or too warm or the walls are falling down. We are painters and we paint. If I were a sculptor, I'd sculpt.

The wonderful news is that when a person with my lack of art background can be successful, then anyone can. I'm not super talented and had no art training. Nothing, nada, zip. No workshops or classes.

This generation is so dead. You ask a kid, 'What are you doing this Saturday?' and they'll be playing video games or watching cable, instead of building model cars or airplanes or doing something creative. Kids today never say, 'Man, I'm really into remote-controlled steamboats.'

Vinyl is the real deal. I've always felt like, until you buy the vinyl record, you don't really own the album. And it's not just me or a little pet thing or some kind of retro romantic thing from the past. It is still alive.

Vinyl survived, we managed not to kill it. Knowing that you’ve taken part in this fight... You can’t imagine the happiness it brings. Every time I see a kid going out of the store with a vinyl record under the arms, my heart beats faster. Music should only be this. An intense emotion.

Well, I sort of don't trust anybody who doesn't like Led Zeppelin.

Well you're in your little room and you're working on something good but if it's really good you're gonna need a bigger room and when you're in the bigger room you might not know what to do you might have to think of how you got started sitting in your little room

We've had experience of involvement in a local scene, and it was a good one, and we've learned a lot from it, and I don't have any need to join into that ever again. It's too counterproductive to writing music and performing to the best of your abilities. It's okay when you're 20 years old - you're getting out there and you're learning - but not when you're 30 years old.

We were like a white family from the 1920s or something. My parents had this bizarre, different way of looking at things from the people that surrounded us. I went to an all-Mexican grade school and an all-black high school, and not many people in those places liked the same stuff as me.

What you think is fake in your head comes off as not enough on camera, a lot of times. You almost have to overdo it, in this overly, sort of Broadway, large-gestures kind of way to come off as being realistic on camera. It's strange. You almost have to act really fake to come off looking real.

When you know your work sells, then seeking a gallery or outdoor show is fine. Then, if an event or art gallery kicks sand in your face don't give up, keep moving forward. Use your brain and eliminate a lot of your personal agony. There are times when you should not take NO for an answer. But there are others when you should never put yourself in the place to be rejected to begin with. Seek the wisdom to know the difference and then go for it. Persevere in the face of disappointment.

When you put something out there into the world, there's all these words you don't want to hear, that you hope people don't say. I don't like anything that starts with 're' - like retro, reinvent, recreate - I hate that. It's always like living in the past - copying, emulating.

With the White Stripes we were trying to trick people into not realising we were playing the blues. We did not want to come off like white kids trying to play black music from 100 years ago so a great way to distract them was by dressing in red, white and black.

Worry means tormenting yourself with disturbing thoughts or fretting about things we have zero control over. If you live in the north there is no need to worry about the snow. You will get plenty each year. If you live in California or Texas you needn't worry about rain because we won't receive any.

You can't be an actor in a small town-you have to go to New York or L.A.

You can't steal an artist's songs and also tell him he can't license that music to a commercial.

You hear a lot of people, they turn 40 and it really bugs them and they get depressed or whatever. I don't know - I just don't feel that way. I feel 19 years old all the time. I mean, it's not a lie. I could easily say, God, I feel 70. Or maybe I seem like I'm 70 or 200 or something to other people, I don't know. My brain feels 19 all the time. And that's a good spot.

You need a little resistance-something to fight against.

Your attitude is more important than the events happening around you. Artists develop a syndrome taught in art schools. It is a malady titled, 'Artistic Temperament'... rudeness, excuses, slovenliness, laziness, clutter, addictions, non-commercial attitudes, un-professionalism... and a good reason for failure.