Quotes from Lupita Nyong'o

Every single laundromat, grocery store, everything is called 'Lupita' in Mexico.

What fame does is there is an illusion of familiarity that is cast into the world. So it's about negotiating with that illusion because, oftentimes, you encounter people who have encountered you, but you haven't encountered them. It's a little weird to find your footing.

Even in my dreams of being an actor, my dream was not in the celebrity. My dream was in the work that I wanted to do.

I do my best work when I feel conviction to say something through the character I play. Always I want to have integrity and not compromise that.

The Hollywood Film Awards were really stressful. It was the biggest press line I'd ever seen.

I have a very ostrich mentality. I feel like I have my head in the sand so no one can see me.

What's becoming very obvious to me is that fashion is art.

I'm interested in generating work for myself. I have trouble with this waiting-for-the-phone-to-ring lifestyle, especially after drama school, which was so creatively fulfilling.

You can't eat beauty, it doesn't sustain you. What is fundamentally beautiful is compassion, for yourself and those around you. That kind of beauty inflamed the heart and merchants the soul.

I realized that beauty was not a thing that I could acquire or consume, it was something that I just had to be.

There is no shame in black beauty.

You can't eat beauty. It doesn't feed you.

That you will feel the validation of your external beauty but also get to the deeper business of being beautiful inside. There is no shade in that beauty.

When I was younger, I was almost too afraid to admit that I wanted to be an actor.

I've loved the opportunity to learn about the fashion world and appreciate it as an art form, and I look forward to my continued education, but I never want it to take over my acting.

It's great to have something to dress up for. You know, I spent three years in slacks at drama school, so now I like putting a dress on.

I can speak of actors that I love. I love Cate Blanchett, Viola Davis, her tenacity. I love Charlize Theron. She's so surprising and so exhilarating, the kinds of projects she takes on. Marion Cotillard as well.

It's only when you risk failure that you discover things. When you play it safe, you're not expressing the utmost of your human experience.

It's in understanding yourself deeply that you can lend yourself to another person's circumstances and another person's experience.

Human beings have an instinct for freedom.