Alvin Ailey Quotes

#1. But the dance speaks to everyone. Otherwise it wouldn't work.

Alvin Ailey

#2. If you live in the elite world of dance, you find yourself in a world rife with racism. Let's face it.

Alvin Ailey

#3. There was still no likelihood that we could make a living from dance. We were doing it because we loved it ... We realized how full we felt; we were surrounded by music and dancing and joy.

Alvin Ailey

#4. We still spend more time chasing funds than we do in the studio in creative work.

Alvin Ailey

#5. In this business, life is one long fund-raising effort.

Alvin Ailey

#6. To be who you are and become what you are capable of is the only goal worth living.

Alvin Ailey

#7. Making dances is an act of progress; it is an act of growth, an act of music, an act of teaching, an act of celebration, an act of joy.

Alvin Ailey

#8. It will take very sophisticated marketing to achieve our aim of bringing more black people into the theater.

Alvin Ailey

#9. Dance is for everybody. I believe that the dance came from the people and that it should always be delivered back to the people.

Alvin Ailey

#10. Choreography is mentally draining, but there's a pleasure in getting into the studio with the dancers and the music.

Alvin Ailey

#11. I am trying to show the world that we are all human beings and that color is not important. What is important is the quality of our work.

Alvin Ailey

#12. Money is a never-ending problem.

Alvin Ailey

#13. Lena Horne is the sweetest and most adorable woman in the world.

Alvin Ailey

#14. One of the processes of your life is to constantly break down that inferiority, to constantly reaffirm that I Am Somebody.

Alvin Ailey

#15. I always want more.

Alvin Ailey

#16. Racism tears down your insides so that no matter what you achieve, you're not quite up to snuff.

Alvin Ailey

#17. I always want to have more dancers in my company.

Alvin Ailey

#18. The creative process is not controlled by a switch you can simply turn on or off; it's with you all the time.

Alvin Ailey

#19. I wanted to explore black culture, and I wanted that culture to be a revelation.

Alvin Ailey

#20. Nothing personal; I just don't have people over.

Alvin Ailey

#21. I'm attracted to long-legged girls with long arms and a little head.

Alvin Ailey

#22. Sometimes you feel bad about yourself when there's no reason to.

Alvin Ailey

#23. My feelings about myself have been terrible.

Alvin Ailey

#24. One of the worst things about racism is what it does to young people.

Alvin Ailey

#25. Everything in dancing is style, allusion, the essence of many thoughts and feelings. The abstraction of many moments.

Alvin Ailey

#26. No matter what you write or choreograph, you feel it's not enough.

Alvin Ailey

#27. My lasting impression of Truman Capote is that he was a terribly gentle, terribly sensitive, and terribly sad man.

Alvin Ailey

#28. My dancers must be able to do anything, and I don't care if they are black or white or purple or green. I want to help show my people how beautiful they are. I want to hold up the mirror to my audience that says this is the way people can be, this is how open people can be.

Alvin Ailey