Quotes from Kiki Smith

As a child I prayed that my calling be revealed - but not with expectation and not with a destination. I became an artist because I didn't know what to do and I thought it was really fun to make things.

I think that sense of always traveling has something to do with anonymity and privacy and pleasure in having a very clear, very reductive life.

It's fun, in a way, to explore what's risky in one's life.

Art is a reflection of everything that impacts your life.

Prior to my father's death, I was having a hard time committing to a career as an artist, but that's not because of who he was - it was because of who I am. It's true, though, that I felt I shouldn't compete with him, and that those feelings went away after he died.

Life is much larger than how we image it, always, but society can be constricting in ways.

Prints mimic what we are as humans: we are all the same and yet every one is different. I think there's a spiritual power in repetition, a devotional quality, like saying rosaries.

I got into animals by drawing hair follicles. I liked drawing hair, and from that I got into feathers and fur, then into images of animals. The patterning is the same, but the proportions of the body change from one animal to the next. A lot of it is just geometry and consciousness.

The hardest thing is remembering that you have some complicity in the things that happen to you in your life.

Life changes a lot. I guarantee you.

My iPhone has changed my life - I spend hours taking photos of the sidewalk as I walk down the street. I like the casualness, that it's low-resolution.

Life really changes. And it gets lighter, for the most part. You tolerate yourself and others better.

My support system is simple - people and time. The miracle of other people in your life.

The miracle of being able to pay attention to other people in your life, and the miracle of being in time, and to continue being in time.

When I was young, it was an exciting time to be in New York.

When you get older, you're running out of time. You care more about trying to stay on the planet a little longer, so you can learn how to draw better!

It is very different when you age. The things that are significant, or what drives you, or the physical experience of being driven, changes over time.

Now, it is much more difficult for young people coming to New York. But also when you're young, you have more time to interact with one another, to discover yourself with people of your generation.

I really love printmaking. It's like a mystery and you're trying to figure out how to rein it in.

It's one of my loose theories that Catholicism and art have gone well together because both believe in the physical manifestation of the spiritual world.

I like Betsy Ross as a model, too, the quilting bee, sitting around with your friends making art, asking what they think, so that you get the benefit of everyone's opinions and so it's not just about you in your you-dom.

As an artist, you want to have an experience. What you need to experience changes over the course of your life because your life changes.

I always say I'm Catholic - but a cultural Catholic. I wouldn't say I'm a spiritual person, although I pray every day.

Artists live in unknown spaces and give themselves over to following something unknown.