I laugh with the sun, and mist that tries so hard to seduce the mountains.
An artist is not special. An artist is an ordinary person who can take ordinary things and make them special.
I no longer identify myself as Japanese or American but a 'citizen of the universe.'
Sculpture is like farming. If you just keep at it, you can get quite a lot done.
An artist looks at a juice bottle, an egg carton, or a newspaper and sees something valuable in them.
I had no intentions of going into sculpture but found that sculpture was just an extension of drawing.
Art is doing. Art deals directly with life.
I spent three years there and encountered great teachers who gave me enough stimulation to last me for the rest of my life - Josef Albers, painter; Buckminster Fuller, inventor; Max Dehn, the mathematician, and many others. Through them, I came to understand the total commitment required if one must be an artist.
Activism is wasteful.
A lot of women wrote to me. Some wrote me long letters on the meaning of the circle and about mythology and about motherhood and the significance or the symbolism of the mermaid and the frogs and the turtles.
It's important to learn how to use your small bits of time. All those begin to count up. It's not the long amounts of time you have that are important. you should learn how to use your snatches of time when they are given to you.
All my wire sculptures come from the same loop. And there's only one way to do it. The idea is to do it simply, and you end up with a shape.
I used to unwind the wire tags that labeled the crates of vegetables and took the fine brass and steel wires and braided and twisted them together to make bracelets, rings, and figures.
Sometimes good comes through adversity. I would not be who I am today had it not been for the internment, and I like who I am.
I think you have to teach kids to work, and you can only teach them to work if you work... I can't delegate jobs if I'm not doing it.
I am able to take a wire line and go into the air and define the air without stealing from anyone. A line can enclose and define space while letting the air remain air.
Because I had the children, I chose to have my studio in my home. I wanted them to understand my work and learn how to work.
Art can only be taught by artists.
If a nonartist teaches a subject called art, it is nonart.
With art, your motor sense should be developed at full capacity.
