"Nothing happens until something moves. When something vibrates, the electrons of the entire universe resonate with it. Everything is connected."
–– Albert Einstein (1879-1955), German-born American theoretical physicist
via: Commonplace Book, 2024, 2025, p. 65.
"It's said that the most complicated thing of all is to achieve simplicity."
–– Jean-Luc Bannalec, pseudonym of Jörg Bong, (b. 1966) a German author.
Source: Jean-Luc Bannalec. Death of a Master Chef. Translated by Jamie Lee Searle. New York: Minotaur Books, 2020 (translation 2024).
via: Commonplace Book 2024, 2025, p. 69.
"We are drowning in information while starving for wisdom. The world henceforth will be run by synthesizers, people able to put together the right information at the right time, think critically about it, and make important choices wisely."
–– Edward O. Wilson (1929-2021), American biologist, naturalist, and writer
via: Commonplace Book 2024, 2025, p. 63.
"Being in between projects is interesting. I've had a really bad work ethic over the past year or two, but now when I look back at all the stuff I shot, even though I thought I was doing a really lazy job of it, like even if you just do like a little tiny bit every single day just by the sheer momentum of committing to an idea, even if it's just a sentence, a title of something –– that ends up turning into something."
–– John Wilson (b. 1986), American documentary filmmaker
Source: Why John Wilson can't stop filming YouTube
"I close my [studio] day with a process I've come to enjoy over the years, creating small works that allow me to play outside my usual medium of oil painting. It's my way of experimenting with materials I'm not typically known for, such as polish and calamine, and working on different surfaces such as wood, paper or canvas. I also explore using watercolours, oil pastels and soft pastels. These pieces are more about embracing mistakes and letting go of the day's creative energy. I don't judge myself when creating these works; they're a space to experiment and release any built-up tension. If one of these works sparks more interest or inspiration overnight, I'll revisit it the next morning, but in the moment, it's just about letting go and playing."
–– Songezo Zantsi (b. 1991), South African visual artist
Source: House and Leisure South Africa, Autumn 2025, Digest/Studio visits, Songezo Zantsi, p. 229.
via: Sketchbook U 21, 2025, p. 8-9.
"Rest and good moods are both essential for sustained and successful work."
–– Oliver Burkeman (b. 1975), British author and journalist
Source: Oliver Burkeman. Meditations for Mortals. Toronto: Allen Lane, 2024; p. 73.
via: Commonplace Book, 2024, 2025, p. 43.
"Just start. Try more things, think later. Be less precious. Make things that aren't going anywhere. Read more. Look away every now and then. Adventures and experiences outside of the studio make more interesting and relatable work."
–– Johannes Jacobus (Koos) Groenewald, South African graphic designer and illustrator
Source: House and Leisure South Africa, Autumn 2025, Digest/Studio visits, Koooooos, p. 230.
via: Sketchbook U 21, 2025, p. 9.
"Where do I get my ideas from? You might as well have asked that of Beethoven. He was goofing around in Germany like everybody else, and all of a sudden this stuff came gushing out of him. It was music. I was goofing around like everybody else in Indiana, and all of a sudden stuff came gushing out. It was disgust with civilization."
–– Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007), American writer, quote from August 10, 2004
Source: Austin Kleon newsletter, Friday April 11, 2025
via: Sketchbook U 21, 2025, p. 11.
"The day you catch an idea you fall in love with, even a small one, is a beautiful day."
–– David Lynch (1946-2025), American filmmaker, visual artist, musician and actor
via: Sketchbook U 21, 2025, p. 13.
"Honesty always gets my attention. Not particularly someone who is honest to me, but someone who is honest to themselves."
–– Heath Ledger (1979-2008), Australian actor
via: Sketchbook U 21, 2025, p. 13.
"Maybe working on the little things as dutifully and honestly as we can is how we stay sane when the world is falling apart."
–– Haruki Murakami (b.1949), Japanese writer
via: Sketchbook U 21, 2025, p. 12.
"A journal is more than a memory goad. It's therapeutic. The act of opening a notebook to put words down stills the crosscurrents of worry, drawing to focus the essential thought patterns that best define us, intersecting those thoughts with the condition of our life at that exact moment. A journal is one of the few anchors the human condition allows us."
"Life is pretty simple: You do some stuff –– most fails, some works. You do more of what works. If it works big, others will copy it. Then you do something else. The trick is in the doing something else."
"I was broke for a very long time, but I always believed in myself and believed in the work and knew I had something special, Sherald recalled. "And so I always tell young artists, the world is full of quitters, so don't quit and you'll eventually rise to the top. And here I am, tada."
–– Amy Sherald (b. 1973), American painter
Source: Olivia Hampton. "Painter Amy Sherald asks: What is American?", https://www.kclu.org/arts-culture/2025-04-09/painter-amy-sherald-asks-what-is-american, April 9, 2025.
"Your ego can become an obstacle to your work. If you start believing in your greatness, it is the death of your creativity."
–– Marina Abramović (b. 1946), Serbian conceptual and performance artist
"Each of us lives an original life. In nature, there is no sameness. No two rocks are alike. No two people are alike. No moment is like another moment. We are born to do certain things. We are born to fill a certain need. We are born as verbs, not nouns."
–– Agnes Martin (1912-2004), Canadian-born American abstract painter
Source: Judy Martin blog, July 16, 2023
"I often think that I don't have a single new idea in my head. But the big mistake is to just wait for inspiration to happen. It won't come looking for you. You have to start doing something: you have to build a trap to catch it. I like to do that by starting the very mundane process of tidying my studio. It may seem like it has nothing to do with the creative job in hand but I think tidying up is a form of daydreaming, and what you're really doing is tidying your mind. It's a kind of mental preparation. It's a way of getting your mind in place to notice something. And that's what being creative is really: it's noticing when something interesting is starting to happen."
–– Brian Eno (b. 1948), British musician and producer
"Little as we know about the way in which we are affected by form, by colour, and light, we do know this, that they have an actual physical effect. Variety of form and brilliancy of colour are actual means of recovery."
–– Florence Nightingale (1820-1910), English social reformer, statistician, and founder of modern nursing
"And I am free to aspire not to a life without problems, but to a life of ever more interesting and absorbing ones."
–– Oliver Burkeman (b. 1975), British author and journalist
Source: Oliver Burkeman. Meditations for Mortals. Toronto: Allen Lane, 2024; p. 78.
via: Commonplace Book, 2024, 2025, p. 43.
"Dailyness is the most important thing. Creating that time every day for the muse to come through."
–– Claire McMillan, American author
Source: Claire McMillan. Alchemy of a Blackbird. Toronto: Atria Books (Simon and Schuster), 2023; p. 3-4.
via: Commonplace Book 2024, 2025, p. 34.
"Everyone is screwed up, broken, clingy, and scared, even the people who seem to have it more or less together. They are much more like you than you would believe. So try not to compare your insides to their outsides."
–– Anne Lamott (b. 1954), American writer
via: Commonplace Book 2024, 2025, p. 46-7.
"Questioning takes the familiar and makes it mysterious again, thus removing the comfort of "knowing"."
–– Julia Brodsky, educator and education researcher based in the United States
Source: Jeff Karp. LIT: Use Nature's Playbook to Energize Your Brain, Spark Ideas, and Ignite Action. New York: William Morrow, 2024; p. 22.
via: Commonplace Book 2024, 2024, p. 60.
"It's a thousand times harder to come back than to become. Becoming famous is hard, but making a comeback is almost impossible."
–– Cher (b. 1946), American singer and actress
Source: Alexandra Jacobs. "Turn Back Time." The New York Times Book Review, Sunday December 8, 2024; p. 27. Re: Cher. Cher: The Memoir, Part One.
via: Commonplace Book, 2024, 2025, p. 58.
"... when I was in the classroom, it felt like the only way for me to keep my attention focused on what the teacher was saying was to doodle at the same time. It creates a buffer that the information can filter through if I'm doing something cognitively at the same time."
–– Walter Scott (b. 1985), Canadian artist and graphic novelist
Source: Emily Donaldson. "Walter Scott pulls no punches in Wendy series." The Globe and Mail, Saturday August 3, 2024; p. R8.
via: Commonplace Book, 2024, 2025, p. 57.
""Are you very frightened, Charlotte?"
""Of course not," I sputtered.
""Then how do you propose to be brave?"
""I am terrified, Miss Gourley."
""Good show, there's your first step. Remember, all must feel fear: The important thing is not to be ruled by it."
–– Ann-Marie MacDonald (b. 1958), Canadian playwright, author, actress, and broadcast host
Source: Ann-Marie MacDonald. Fayne. Toronto: Alfred A. Knopf Canada, 2022; p. 669.
via: Commonplace Book 2024, 2025, p. 32.
"Work is done, then forgotten. Therefore it lasts forever."
–– Lao Tzu (c. 500 BCE), Chinese philosopher and writer
Source: Tao Te Ching
via: Commonplace Book 2024, 2025, p. 34.
"When you become comfortable with uncertainty, infinite possibilities open up in your life."
–– Eckhart Tolle (b. 1948), German spiritual teacher and writer
via: Commonplace Book 2024, 2025, p. 59.
