Quotes from Andrei Tarkovsky

Hemos llegado a una situación en la que el público prefiere cualquier basura comercial a Fresas salvajes de Bergman o a El eclipse de Antonioni

Artistic creation, after all, is not subject to absolute laws, valid from age to age; since it is related to the more general aim of mastery of the world, it has an infinite number of facets, the link that connect man with his vital activity; and even if the path towards knowledge is unending, no step that takes man nearer to a full understanding of the meaning of his existence can be too small to count.

Masterpieces, not always distinguished or distinguishable among all the works with pretensions to genius, are scattered about the world like warning notices in a mine field.

Let them laugh at their passions.

If two people have been able to experience the same thing even once, they will be able to understand each other.

I think that what a person normally goes to the cinema for is time: for time lost or spent or not yet had. He goes there for living experience; for cinema, like no other art, widens, enhances and concentrates a person's experience—and not only enhances it but makes it longer, significantly longer.

A child doesn't have to be a prodigy. He has to be a child. The only thing that matters is that he shouldn't become 'stuck' in childishness.

I believe in one thing: the human spirit is immortal and indestructible. In the beyond there could be anything, it is of no importance whatsoever. What we call death is not death. It's a rebirth. A caterpillar becomes a cocoon. I think there is a life after death and it is that that is unnerving. It would be so much simpler to conceive of oneself as a telephone cord that is unplugged. Then you could live any way that you wanted. God would have no importance of any kind.

Music miraculously penetrates your very soul.

The only function of consciousness is to produce fabrications. True knowledge is achieved in the heart and in the soul.

El artista no tiene ningún derecho moral para dejarse llevar a un abstracto nivel medio, para hacer que su obra sea más comprensible, más accesible. Esto no acarrearía otra cosa que la decadencia del arte, cuando en realidad esperamos su florecimiento, creemos en las posibilidades potenciales y aún no desarrolladas del artista y también en una elevación de las exigencias del público. O al menos queremos creer en todo ello.

Allí donde alguien se orienta deliberadamente por el público, estamos ante un producto de la industria del entretenimiento, ante shows y espectáculos de masas, nunca ante el arte, que indefectiblemente tiene que seguir sus leyes internas, inmanentes, con independencia de que sean aceptadas o no encuentren acogida

I somehow think that it's better to screen inferior literature, which nonetheless contains the seed of something real- which can be developed in the film and grow into something wonderful as a result of going through your hands

The rhythm of editing, the length of a frame- these are not merely dictated by the professional need to establish a link with the audience (as they are thought to be). They express the character and the originality of the author of the film. At the present time cineastes use editing rhythm to gild the pill that has to be swallowed by the unfortunate audience. According to me, entirely in order to make money.

It is obvious to everyone that man's material aggrandisement has not been synchronous with spiritual progress. The point has been reached where we seem to have a fatal incapacity for mastering our material achievements in order to use them for our own good. We have created a civilisation which threatens to annihilate mankind.

I feel restricted, my soul is restricted inside me, I need another living space.

If you try to please audiences, uncritically accepting their tastes, it can only mean that you have no respect for them.

I returned to Moscow from Italy to find everything in a foul state. My room at home full of guests, smoking, loud music, wine and brandy spilt on the table. Quite revolting.

In any case it is perfectly clear that the goal for all art—unless of course it is aimed at the 'consumer', like a saleable commodity—is to explain to the artist himself and to those around him what man lives for, what is the meaning of his existence. To explain to people the reason for their appearance on this planet; or if not to explain, at least to pose the question.

All creative work strives for simplicity, for perfectly simple expression; and this means reaching down into the furthest depths of the recreation of life. But that is the most painful part of creative work: finding the shortest path between what you want to say or express and its ultimate reproduction in the finished image. The struggle for simplicity is the painful search for a form adequate to the truth you have grasped.

For the cinema image is essentially the observation of a phenomenon passing through time.

The first thing to describe is the event, not your attitude to it. Your attitude has to be made clear by the film as a whole, to be part of its total impact. In a mosaic each separate piece is of a particular, single colour. It may be blue, or white, or red — they are all different. And then you look at the completed picture and see what the author had in mind.

Me dirijo a casa de mi MADRE, a la que no veo desde hace un siglo y que ha envejecido tan vertiginosamente que no me doy cuenta del tiempo: el tiempo que un hombre debe percibir y controlar si no quiere que su vida pase volando de una forma injusta e impetuosa.

The cinema image is the observation of a phenomenon passing through time. Time becomes the very foundation of cinema...Time exerts a pressure which runs through the shot ...Just as a quivering reed can tell you about the current or water pressure of a river, in the same way we know the movement of time as it flows through the shot.