Quotes: John Wilson

"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

Quotes: Kyo Maclear

"To what do we commit ourselves and for how long? Monet painted the Nymphéas two hundred and forty-seven times. "It took me some time to understand my waterlilies," he wrote. The older I get the more I understand this impulse toward reduction and repetition; the more I understand there is infinitude in a spartan focus, in Agnes Martin's geometries, in Giorgio Morandi's vases. Focalizing can be regenerative even for those of us who believe the sprawling clamour of the world demands our promiscuous attention.

–– Kyo Maclear (b. 1970), British-born, Canadian writer and artist 

Source: Kyo Maclear. Unearthing: A Story of Tangled Love and Family Secrets. Toronto: Alfred A. Knopf Canada, 2023; pp. 193. 

via: Commonplace Book 2022, 2023, p.108. 

Quotes: Robert Fripp

"Discipline, primarily, is our capacity to make a commitment in time." 

–– Robert Fripp (b. 1946) English guitarist, record producer and author 

Source: Austin Kleon newsletter December 1, 2023. Robert Fripp. The Guitar Circle. 

via: Aboveground Art Supplies Sketchbook 2020, 2023, p. 27.

Quotes: Nicholas Jennings re: Neil Peart

"Mastering his instrument was always Mr. Peart's mission. He continued studying, taking drum lessons late in life from percussion legends such as Freddie Gruber, wanting to learn more improvisational playing. He never stopped practicing. "My worst fear is not having a heart attack," he said in the 2016 documentary Time Stand Still, "but that I'm going to have one on stage and wreck the show. That's what makes you a professional. You don't go on stage with your frailties. Or your regrets or your resentments. Every night, you have to bring that commitment." 

–– Nicholas Jennings, Canadian music journalist & Neil Peart (1952-2020), Canadian drummer in the band Rush. 

Source: Jennings, Nicholas. Neil Peart, Musician, 67: "Rush's Drummer was one of the World's Best," The Globe and Mail, Saturday, January 18, 2020, p. B24. 

via: Day In and Day Out Notebook, 2020, p. 40-41.