The people that have inspired me the most were dancers and…

The mystery of Christopher Wheeldon deepens. Yes, he's the most talented of the younger ballet choreographers - indeed, where's the competition? Yes, he's particularly…

— Robert Gottlieb

One of the eternal mysteries of ballet is how untalented choreographers find backers for their work, and then find good dancers to perform in…

— Robert Gottlieb

So many dancers feel that what they look like is more important than who they are. This is a real danger for dancers who…

— Alonzo King

When a dancer comes onstage, he is not just a blank slate that the choreographer has written on. Behind him he has all the…

— Mikhail Baryshnikov

Choreographers tend to treat ballet dancers like kids they can manipulate.

— Sylvie Guillem

Afro-Caribbean influences are in me as a creative being the same way Spanish influences were in Picasso's work. I think the notion of labels…

— Garth Fagan

Solo dancing does not exist: the dancer dances with the floor: add another dancer and you have a quartet: each dance with the other…

— Steve Paxton

Practice is a means of inviting the perfection desired.

— Martha Graham

A dancer should learn from all the arts. Go to museums and look at the paintings. See how they balance things. Everything you do…

— Alicia Alonso

As a dancer I had worked with really hard choreographers, Jerome Robbins being the toughest. And you learned what it is to hit against…

— Joan Tewkesbury

You are not a female or a male - you are a dancer. And when I started going into choreography I became part of…

— Anne Fletcher

What makes people and companies and artistic directors and choreographers interested in working with dancers is the ability to kind of let go of…

— Misty Copeland

I am sincerely trying now to create a dance technique based entirely upon corrective exercises, created with a knowledge of human anatomy; a technique…

— Lester Horton

Dancers, like all performing artists, like nothing better than to be challenged.

— Karen Kain

Someone is dead. Even the trees know it, those poor old dancers who come on lewdly, all pea-green scarfs and spine pole.

— Anne Sexton