NITCH

Photo of Stanley Kubrick

Stanley Kubrick // "If you really want to communicate something, even if it’s just an emotion or an attitude, let alone an idea, the least effective and least enjoyable way is directly. It only goes in about an inch. But if you can get people to the point where they have to think a moment what it is you’re getting at, and then discover it, the thrill of discovery goes right through the heart."

Photo of Charles Bukowski

Charles Bukowski // "We are always asked to understand the other person’s viewpoint no matter how out-dated, foolish or obnoxious. One is asked to view their total error, their life-waste with kindliness, especially if they are aged. But age is the total of our doing. They have aged badly because they have lived out of focus, they have refused to see. Not their fault? Whose fault? Mine? I am asked to hide my viewpoint from them for fear of their fear. Age is no crime, but the shame of a deliberately wasted life among so many deliberately wasted lives, is."

Photo of Jean-Paul Sartre

Jean-Paul Sartre // "There may be more beautiful times, but this one is ours."

Photo of Robin Williams

Robin Williams // "We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. So medicine, law, business, engineering...these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love...these are what we stay alive for."

Photo of Martha Graham

Martha Graham // "There is a vitality, a life force, an energy...that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist... The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is nor how valuable nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open."

Photo of Jim Morrison

Jim Morrison // "That's what real love amounts to...letting a person be what he really is. Most people love you for who you pretend to be. To keep their love, you keep pretending, performing. You get to love your pretence...people get so used to their image, they grow attached to their masks. They love their chains. They forget all about who they really are. And if you try to remind them, they hate you for it, they feel like you're trying to steal their most precious possession."

Photo of Anthony Bourdain

Anthony Bourdain // "Travel isn’t always pretty. It isn’t always comfortable. Sometimes it hurts, it even breaks your heart. But that’s okay. The journey changes you; it should change you. It leaves marks on your memory, on your consciousness, on your heart, and on your body. You take something with you. Hopefully, you leave something good behind."

Photo of Nelson Mandela

Nelson Mandela // "There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered."

Photo of Andrei Tarkovsky

Andrei Tarkovsky // "Weakness is a great thing...strength is nothing. When a man is just born, he is weak and flexible. When he dies, he is hard and insensitive. When a tree is growing, it's tender and pliant. But when it's dry and hard, it dies. Hardness and strength are death's companions. Pliancy and weakness are expressions of the freshness of being...what has hardened will never win."

Photo of Aurora

Aurora // "It can be really hard to be a human...and if you ever feel like you’re not doing a good enough job as a human, then know that, in a day, our only mission could be just not to die...and then you are officially a successful human. And sometimes I think that’s really nice to think about because it gives me less pressure to do anything more in a day, because as long as I end up in my bed alive, I’ve done a good job."

Photo of Leonard Cohen

Leonard Cohen // "We don’t want to live a frivolous life, we don’t want to live a superficial life. We want to be serious with each other, with our friends, with our work. That doesn’t necessarily mean gloomy or grim, but seriousness...is something that we are deeply hungry for, to take ourselves seriously and to be able to enjoy the nourishment of seriousness, that gravity, that weight."

Photo of James Baldwin and Nina Simone

James Baldwin (& Nina Simone) // "In order to have a conversation with someone, you must reveal yourself."