I no longer identify myself as Japanese or American but a 'citizen of the universe.' Ruth Asawa More Quotes by Ruth Asawa More Quotes From Ruth Asawa When you put a seed in the ground, it doesn't stop growing after eight hours. It keeps going every minute that it's in the earth. We, too, need to keep growing every moment of every day that we are on this earth. Ruth Asawa eight growing needs The best ideas come unexpectedly from a conversation or a common activity like watering the garden. These can get lost or slip away if not acted on when they occur. Ruth Asawa garden common ideas All my wire sculptures come from the same loop. And theres only one way to do it. The idea is to do it simply, and you end up with a shape. Ruth Asawa sculpture wire ideas Sometimes good comes through adversity. I would not be who I am today had it not been for the internment, and I like who I am. Ruth Asawa adversity who-i-am today Art is doing. Art deals directly with life. Ruth Asawa art-is deals art Art can only be taught by artists. Ruth Asawa taught artist art If a nonartist teaches a subject called art, it is nonart. Ruth Asawa teach subjects art I laugh with the sun, and mist that tries so hard to seduce the mountains. Ruth Asawa mountains laugh hard sun Sculpture is like farming. If you just keep at it, you can get quite a lot done. Ruth Asawa like you farming done Activism is wasteful. Ruth Asawa wasteful activism I am able to take a wire line and go into the air and define the air without stealing from anyone. A line can enclose and define space while letting the air remain air. Ruth Asawa without i-am go space An artist is not special. An artist is an ordinary person who can take ordinary things and make them special. Ruth Asawa person things artist special We used to make patterns in the dirt, hanging our feet off the horse-drawn farm equipment. We made endless hourglass figures that I now see as the forms within forms in my crocheted wire sculptures. Ruth Asawa farm hanging see feet A lot of women wrote to me. Some wrote me long letters on the meaning of the circle and about mythology and about motherhood and the significance or the symbolism of the mermaid and the frogs and the turtles. Ruth Asawa me women motherhood long I used to unwind the wire tags that labeled the crates of vegetables and took the fine brass and steel wires and braided and twisted them together to make bracelets, rings, and figures. Ruth Asawa fine steel vegetables together With art, your motor sense should be developed at full capacity. Ruth Asawa full sense your art I had no intentions of going into sculpture but found that sculpture was just an extension of drawing. Ruth Asawa going just sculpture drawing I'm not so interested in the expression of something, but I'm more interested in what the material can do. And so that's why I keep exploring. Ruth Asawa why more something expression It wasn't stone. It wasn't welded steel. It wasn't traditional sculpture. They thought it was craft, or something else, but not art. They couldn't define it in the early Fifties when I was starting out. Ruth Asawa stone something thought art I am interested in finding solutions to problems. Ruth Asawa finding interested i-am problems
