25 Marina Abramovic Quotes on Performance, Endurance, and Presence
Marina Abramovic (born 1946) is a Serbian performance artist who has been called "the grandmother of performance art." Born in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, to parents who were both Partisan heroes, Abramovic grew up in an atmosphere of strict discipline that would profoundly shape her artistic practice of physical endurance and self-imposed suffering.
Since the early 1970s, Abramovic has pushed the boundaries of performance art, using her own body as subject, object, and medium. Her early works tested the limits of physical and psychological endurance — she cut herself with knives, whipped herself, lay on blocks of ice, and in one notorious performance, invited audience members to do anything to her body with 72 objects including a loaded gun.
Her twelve-year artistic and romantic partnership with German artist Ulay (1976-1988) produced some of the most iconic performance works of the twentieth century. Their collaborations explored themes of ego, trust, and endurance, culminating in their separation performance, "The Great Wall Walk," in which each walked from opposite ends of the Great Wall of China to meet in the middle and say goodbye.
In 2010, Abramovic created "The Artist Is Present" at the Museum of Modern Art, sitting motionless for 736 hours across three months while visitors sat across from her one at a time. The performance became a cultural phenomenon, moving many participants to tears and demonstrating the raw power of sustained human connection.
Abramovic has dedicated her career to exploring the relationship between performer and audience, the limits of the body, and the possibilities of the mind. Through the Marina Abramovic Institute, she continues to develop methods for prolonging concentration and expanding consciousness, ensuring that performance art endures as a vital form of expression.
Here are 25 quotes from Marina Abramovic that illuminate her philosophy on art, presence, and the transformative power of performance.
Who Is Marina Abramović?
| Item | Details |
|---|---|
| Born | November 30, 1946 |
| Nationality | Serbian |
| Occupation | Performance Artist |
| Known For | The Artist Is Present, pioneering endurance performance art |
Key Achievements and Episodes
The Artist Is Present: 736 Hours of Silence
From March 14 to May 31, 2010, Abramović sat motionless in a wooden chair at the Museum of Modern Art in New York for 736 hours over 75 days, silently gazing at whoever sat across from her. Over 850,000 people attended; some waited in line for hours. Many were moved to tears by the simple act of sustained eye contact. When her former partner Ulay unexpectedly sat down, both broke into tears. The Artist Is Present became the most attended performance art piece in MoMA’s history and demonstrated the extraordinary power of human presence and vulnerability.
Rhythm 0: Giving the Audience Complete Control
In 1974, in a gallery in Naples, Abramović placed 72 objects on a table, including a rose, perfume, honey, a knife, a loaded pistol, and a single bullet. She invited the audience to use any object on her body however they wished for six hours. Initially gentle, the audience grew increasingly aggressive: they cut her clothes, drew blood with thorns, and one person held the loaded gun to her head before another intervened. The performance demonstrated how quickly ordinary people can become dangerous when given absolute power over another human being.
On Performance and Art
Abramovic's approach to performance and art has consistently pushed the boundaries of what the human body can endure and what constitutes an artwork. In Rhythm 0 (1974), performed at a Naples gallery, she placed 72 objects on a table — including a rose, honey, a feather, a scalpel, a loaded pistol, and a single bullet — and invited the audience to use them on her body for six hours. The experience, which escalated to the point where gallery staff intervened, revealed the thin veneer separating civilized behavior from cruelty. Her twelve-year artistic and romantic partnership with the German performance artist Ulay, from 1976 to 1988, produced some of the most significant collaborative performances in art history, including Rest Energy (1980), in which they held a drawn bow and arrow pointed at her heart for four minutes. Their final collaboration, The Lovers — The Great Wall Walk (1988), saw each of them walk from opposite ends of the Great Wall of China to meet in the middle and say goodbye.
"The function of the artist in a disturbed society is to give awareness of the universe, to ask the right questions, and to elevate the mind."
Widely attributed to Marina Abramovic
"Performance is a mental and physical construction that the performer makes in a specific time in a space in front of an audience."
Widely attributed to Marina Abramovic
"Art must be beautiful, artist must be beautiful — I always hated that idea."
From her performance "Art Must Be Beautiful, Artist Must Be Beautiful" (1975)
"If you want to create something that truly changes people, you have to be ready to give everything."
From an interview
"The hardest thing to do is something which is close to nothing."
On "The Artist Is Present" (2010)
"When you perform, you don't have the right to cry. You have to perform and not cry, and this is the most difficult thing."
Widely attributed to Marina Abramovic
On Endurance and the Body
Abramovic's explorations of endurance and the body were shaped by her upbringing under the strict discipline of her parents, both of whom were decorated Partisan heroes in Tito's Yugoslavia. Her mother imposed a military-style regimen that included prohibiting her from leaving the house after 10 PM until she was 29 years old — a constraint that, paradoxically, prepared her for the extreme self-discipline her performances demand. In Thomas Lips (1975), she carved a five-pointed star into her stomach with a razor blade, whipped herself until she lost consciousness, and lay on a cross of ice blocks until the audience intervened. The House with the Ocean View (2002), performed at the Sean Kelly Gallery in New York, saw her living on three elevated platforms for twelve days without food, speaking, reading, or writing, in full view of gallery visitors. These works explore the threshold where physical pain transforms into transcendence and the body becomes a site of spiritual transformation.
"The body is a place for the spirit to live. The body can go through tremendous amounts of experience and pain if the spirit is free."
Widely attributed to Marina Abramovic
"I learned that if you go through physical pain, you can reach another state of consciousness."
From an interview
"Your body is a temple, and at the same time, it is the laboratory."
Widely attributed to Marina Abramovic
"Limits exist only in the minds of those who do not dream."
Widely attributed to Marina Abramovic
"You have to be willing to fail, to be uncertain, to go into the unknown."
From an interview
"I think the most powerful thing about art is that it can change the chemistry of your body."
Widely attributed to Marina Abramovic
On Presence and Connection
Abramovic's interest in presence and human connection reached its most celebrated expression in The Artist Is Present, performed at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 2010, during which she sat motionless in a wooden chair for 736 hours over nearly three months, silently gazing into the eyes of over 1,500 visitors who sat across from her one at a time. The performance became a cultural phenomenon, drawing celebrities and art lovers alike, and the moment when her former partner Ulay unexpectedly appeared and sat across from her — bringing both of them to tears — became one of the most viewed art videos on the internet. The accompanying retrospective was the most visited performance art exhibition in MoMA's history, attracting over 850,000 visitors. Her emphasis on the transformative power of sustained attention and mutual presence has influenced practitioners far beyond the art world, from mindfulness practitioners to psychotherapists.
"When you are in the present, time doesn't exist."
Widely attributed to Marina Abramovic
"If you sit and look into someone's eyes for a long period of time, something happens. You start to see the universe."
On "The Artist Is Present"
"We are so used to doing that we have forgotten how to be."
Widely attributed to Marina Abramovic
"When you look into a person's eyes, you see their soul. There is no hiding."
From interviews about "The Artist Is Present"
"The moment you start thinking about whether people will like your work, you've lost."
Widely attributed to Marina Abramovic
On Life and Courage
At nearly eighty, Abramovic continues to perform, teach, and develop new work with undiminished intensity. Her retrospective at the Royal Academy of Arts in London in 2023 was the institution's first major exhibition dedicated to a female artist in its 255-year history. She founded the Marina Abramovic Institute (MAI) to preserve and promote performance art and long-durational works, developing the "Abramovic Method" — a series of exercises designed to heighten participants' awareness of their own physical and mental states. Her 2016 memoir, Walk Through Walls, detailed her life with characteristic fearlessness, from her turbulent childhood in Belgrade to her grueling performances to her complex relationships. Abramovic's insistence that art requires courage — the willingness to be vulnerable, to face pain, and to be fully present — has made her not just the grandmother of performance art but one of the most compelling voices in contemporary culture.
"An artist should not lie to himself or to others. An artist should not steal ideas from other artists. An artist should not compromise for the art market."
From "An Artist's Life Manifesto"
"I think the best thing in life is to do something nobody believes you can do."
Widely attributed to Marina Abramovic
"Trust is something you build. It doesn't come easily, and it shouldn't."
On her collaborative works with Ulay
"Life and death are just two sides of the same coin. You can't have one without the other, and the artist must confront both."
From an interview
"I believe that the artist's role in society is more important now than ever."
Widely attributed to Marina Abramovic
Frequently Asked Questions About Marina Abramović
What is Marina Abramović's most famous performance?
Abramović's most famous performance is The Artist Is Present (2010) at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, in which she sat silently in a chair for 736 hours over nearly three months, making eye contact with individual visitors who sat across from her. Over 750,000 people attended, many waiting hours for their turn. The performance became a cultural phenomenon when visitors were moved to tears by the simple act of sustained human connection. When her former partner Ulay unexpectedly sat across from her, Abramović broke her stillness to reach out and hold his hands, creating one of the most emotional moments in contemporary art.
What is performance art and why is Marina Abramović important?
Performance art is an art form in which the artist's body and actions, performed live for an audience, constitute the artwork itself. Abramović is considered the grandmother of performance art because of her fifty-year career pushing the boundaries of physical and psychological endurance. In Rhythm 0 (1974), she placed 72 objects on a table, including a loaded gun, and allowed the audience to use them on her for six hours. Her work with former partner Ulay included walking the entire Great Wall of China from opposite ends to meet in the middle and break up. She has established performance art as a legitimate museum art form.
What happened during Marina Abramović's Rhythm 0 performance?
In Rhythm 0 (1974) in Naples, Abramović placed 72 objects on a table — including a rose, honey, a feather, scissors, a scalpel, a loaded gun, and a single bullet — and invited the audience to use them on her body however they wished for six hours. Initially, people were gentle, offering her flowers and kisses. But as hours passed, the audience became increasingly aggressive: they cut her clothes, drew blood with thorns, and one person held the loaded gun to her head before others intervened. When the performance ended, Abramović walked toward the audience and they fled, unable to confront her as a person.
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