30 Inspiring Quotes for Artists About Creativity

Welcome to get a dose of wisdom and inspiration with a bunch of quotes collecting ideas and insights from famous thinkers about creativity, its sources, its importance, and its ability to change the world.

inspiring quotes about creativity illustration nutsa avaliani — *Illustration by Nutsa Avaliani*

Creativity is intelligence having fun.
(Albert Einstein)

You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.
(Maya Angelou)

That’s the great secret of creativity. You treat ideas like cats: you make them follow you.
(Ray Bradbury)

Creativity is a type of learning process where teacher and pupil are located in the same individual.
(Arthur Koestler)

Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.
(Pablo Picasso)

From 30,000 feet, creating looks like art. From ground level, it’s a to-do list.
(Ben Arment)

You cannot discover new oceans unless you have the courage to lose sight of the shore.
(Andre Gide)

Any activity becomes creative when the doer cares about doing it right or better.
(John Updike)

Creativity is a wild mind and a disciplined eye.
(Dorothy Parker)

There are no formulas in creative work. I do many variations, which is a question of curiosity. I arrive at many different configurations – some just slight variations, others more radical – of an original idea. It is a game of evolution.
(Paul Rand)

Creativity is thinking up new things. Innovation is doing new things.
(Theodore Levitt)

Curiosity about life in all of its aspects, I think, is still the secret of great creative people.
(Leo Burnett)

There is no doubt that creativity is the most important human resource of all. Without creativity, there would be no progress, and we would be forever repeating the same patterns.
(Edward de Bono)

Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine, and at last, you create what you will.
(George Bernard Shaw)

The difference between science and the arts is not that they are different sides of the same coin even, or even different parts of the same continuum, but rather, they are manifestations of the same thing. The arts and sciences are avatars of human creativity.
(Mae Jemison)

Don’t think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it’s good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art.
(Andy Warhol)

Creativity is a gift. It doesn’t come through if the air is cluttered.
(John Lennon)

Creativity is as important as literacy and numeracy, and I actually think people understand that creativity is important – they just don’t understand what it is.
(Ken Robinson)

An essential aspect of creativity is not being afraid to fail.
(Edwin Land)

You have to be burning with an idea, or a problem, or a wrong that you want to right. If you’re not passionate enough from the start, you’ll never stick it out.
(Steve Jobs)

Make an empty space in any corner of your mind, and creativity will instantly fill it.
(Dee Hock)

Creativity involves breaking out of established patterns in order to look at things in a different way.
(Edward de Bono)

There are painters who transform the sun to a yellow spot, but there are others who with the help of their art and their intelligence, transform a yellow spot into sun.
(Pablo Picasso)

Creativity is not just for artists. It’s for businesspeople looking for a new way to close a sale; it’s for engineers trying to solve a problem; it’s for parents who want their children to see the world in more than one way.
(Twyla Tharp)

Creativity takes courage.
(Henri Matisse)

Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.
(Scott Adams)

The creative person wants to be a know-it-all. He wants to know about all kinds of things: ancient history, nineteenth-century mathematics, current manufacturing techniques, flower arranging, and hog futures. Because he never knows when these ideas might come together to form a new idea. It may happen six minutes later or six months, or six years down the road. But he has faith that it will happen.
(Carl Ally)

Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things.
(Steve Jobs)