Business Interviews
Benoît Astier de Villatte and Ivan Pericoli: “It’s a universe on its own”
Clive Davis: “You’ve got to earn it”
Dennis Paphitis: “Life without some excess, forget it”
Eric Wahlforss: “We had nothing else”
Federico Marchetti: “You cannot be a follower”
Frédéric Malle: “Something had to change”
Gerhard Steidl: “I turn everything upside down”
Giorgio Armani: “We all need to step up”
Ian Schrager: “It was like a lightning bolt”
Jon Gray: “Home is where the heart is”
Marie-Louise Sciò: “It’s much more personal”
Philipp Mainzer: “It just depends on how you use it”
Pierre Bergé: “Yves died at the right time”
Pierre Hermé: “It comes from curiosity”
Renzo Rosso: “We have gained respect”
Richard Saul Wurman: “My world is a lattice”
Tony Wheeler: “I want to try somewhere different”
Yves Béhar: “You can’t think selfishly about design”
Life
- “The journey of an artist is a journey of discovery and some engagement with the nature of material, with bodily things and all that has led me to this place. I’m really interested in that as a process because the process moves you in directions that you couldn’t rationally put there.”Anish KapoorUK, Artist
- “I give my best performances when I am almost snapping. It is like tuning a violin. You want that note from a string so you tune it until it almost breaks – but then you get that note. It is dangerous, but it is also sublime.”Ben KingsleyUK, Actor
- “We're not having to run from predatory animals like we did for hundreds of thousands of years before. So now we have to make up new activities to fulfill those emotional needs. There is a certain something about the ever-present danger of death that makes living so great.”Laird HamiltonUS, Surfer
- “Right now we are 40 people working in Osteria Francescana, for 28 or 30 covers a night. So, it’s totally the opposite of a business. You cannot survive with that. But we believe in those kinds of dreams and so I keep investing, and reinvesting, and reinvesting.”Massimo BotturaItaly, Chef
- “I am less anxious to have a successful career. There were times when I was anxious — even in the past, people said, ‘You make successful films.’ But my films were never successful. Even The Godfather got a terrible review. My films did better over time.”Francis Ford CoppolaUS, Film Director
- “I’ve been very lucky — I took the risk to do the things that interested me, so I could have no possible complaints. There’s nothing else I could ask for, really, and if I drop dead tomorrow, I would have had a terrific time.”Robert HarrisUK, Author
- “I don’t think I’m ever going to stop wanting to see and experience things. I think the day that you don’t long for that anymore is the day you have kind of given up.”Sienna MillerUK, Actor
- “I think all actors have to be dreamers. I think every citizen of every kind of society has to dream. If you stop dreaming, it’s over.”Bruce DernUS, Actor
- “I never have been into trends. Not now or then! I was born like that, in fact, if I see too much of something, I change it. I like independence. I love the eccentrics. Find your style and stick to it.”Manolo BlahnikSpain, Shoe Designer
- “When you are at a crossroads, mistakes can help you decide the right way forward, and I think I really grew when I understood that I need to accept my mistakes.”Ana RošSlovenia, Chef
- “It’s a huge peace to allow yourself to be vulnerable. You gain a sense of freedom and understanding and forgiveness for being human. Instead of trying to control things and make it the way you want them, you have to be more open.”Brie LarsonUS, Actress
- “Everybody is amazing at something — some people write music, some people are leaders, some people raise children, some people cook food. If you find what it is that you can offer to your fellow.”Nick OffermanUS, Actor
- “I act on intuition. I just let my intuition go in situations of fear. I live from my heart. I will continue doing things the way I have done them my whole life. And it gave me mostly a great time.”Antonio BanderasSpain, Actor
- “Any kind of quest for achievement has some kind of a personal drive behind it. I'm sure some people would say that it's obviously about the ego, but on the other hand, it's not as if I'm competing against anybody. It's not as if I'm trying to outdo anybody. It's just me trying to do something to see if I can.”Alex HonnoldUS, Rock Climber
- “I just want to do everything as good as I possibly can but it is also good to act on an idea and fail — and then you get something out of it. I think it’s really important to not be afraid of failure and to push yourself to try things and jump in the cold water.”Juergen TellerGermany, Photographer
- “Risks are very important to me. It’s the only thing that will define the next career move or else I’ll be plateauing. I’ll be completely stale if I don’t take risks. And that’s not just my career.”Freida PintoIndia, Actress
- “Making something or creating something is about looking and exploring the potential, and I want to do that right up until the day of the performance. And then when we’re performing, I want to do it a bit more. There’s no reason we can’t.”Wayne McGregorUK, Choreographer
- “I think you always have to have risk when you’re creating a piece of art. Without that, I don’t understand really what the drive is to succeed. It’s the risk factor that, weirdly, keeps you feeling safe. It keeps you on your toes.”Thea SharrockUK, Theater Director
- “If I knew that tomorrow a meteorite would destroy our planet, I would start shooting a new film today.”Werner HerzogGermany, Film Director
- “Being creative and keeping your brain occupied is very sensible because if you don’t you die, slowly. Sometimes I feel tired and think I ought to give it up, I don’t want to just retire. I enjoy it all.”Anthony HopkinsWales, Actor
- “One of the reasons why I have this much success is because I’m hard on myself. Until now, I never really saw myself as a talented chef! I don’t take the easy way. I put in the time. From the age of 17 until 23, I didn’t take any vacations, I had almost no days off.”Tim RaueGermany, Chef
- “If you’re doing one thing, you can burn yourself out. But for me, if ever one of those things burnt out, I would have moved to another one. So it makes it difficult but it makes it possible to keep going.”Peter BlakeUK, Artist
- “One of the things that I’m striving for is an authenticity, to do things which feel natural and make choices which feel authentic and real. I think in a way you sort of can’t help sounding like yourself. You can’t help but put yourself into your work.”Max RichterUK, Composer
- “Follow the things you love! Follow the things that you are intensely passionate about. Follow the things that you like to do, which often to others might seem unimportant.”Daniel LibeskindPoland, Architect
- “If you work with somebody for a long time, you have to challenge them otherwise you jeopardize your relationship. You have to constantly reinterpret your work together and provide a new vision of your relationship.”Willy VanderperreBelgium, Photographer
- “When you’re young so many things happen and it’s really hard, but you have to fight. Sometimes to get what you want you need to have a really strong past to make sure that you become a warrior and you are not scared about anything and you fight through the night.”Olivier RousteingFrance, Fashion Designer
- “I think you have to slow down a little bit. But I am just trying to make work; I am just out there making work. I take care of myself so that I can survive. I used to not take care of myself so well, but now I do.”Larry ClarkUS, Film Director
- “If people don’t like the pictures, I don’t care. To me, there’s only one point of view: that’s mine.”Harry BensonUK, Photographer
- “I really lacked confidence at the very beginning. At first I was quite intimidated! I wasn’t accepted in the kitchen initially, I wasn’t part of the system; the other chefs didn’t welcome me. But in the end, those experiences made all the difference. It freed me.”Anne-Sophie PicFrance, Chef
- “It’s easy to have inspiration and have a vision and an aesthetic, but if you don’t have the execution and you don’t get it out there properly and on time, it doesn’t matter. It’ll sink.”Rick OwensUS, Fashion Designer
- “I think when you’re an artist who’s been around for a while like I have you understand that it’s almost impossible to make work that is unanimously loved or understood! You can’t please everyone, and that is a great realization.”Shirin NeshatIran, Artist
- “I think you get more confident as you get older. You realize what your strengths and weaknesses are and you’re more okay with your weaknesses and you value your strengths more. I look forward to being 50 and I’m hoping that I’m as confident as some of the people that I look up to.”Elisabeth MossUS, Actress
- “I feel very lucky. There is luck behind me, there’s luck in front of me, there’s luck ahead of me. But that is a perspective that requires a lot of work. It doesn’t come naturally.”Jonathan Safran FoerUS, Author
- “If you are ambitious, you are running in a tunnel that never ends. You will always find something new to go after.”Curtis ‘50 Cent’ JacksonUS, Musician
- “I try not to look back. I’m looking forward. I’m worried more about what I’m going to do next week than I am what I did last week. There are too many things to do. Looking back is for everybody else.”Neil YoungCanada, Musician
- “Wherever any of us have been wounded, if we dive into what those wounds are, if we go down into and do the hard work within those wounds, we’ll actually find ourselves, we’ll find our real giftedness, a sincere, true giftedness.”Andrew GarfieldUK, Actor
- “I don’t regret anything. I feel that I’ve made what I would call mistakes. But everything you do is a part of you. And you get something from it. The idea and excitement of being in these situations and places — they are more than just memories, they inform your life.”Al PacinoUS, Actor
- “I think an ambition as a performer, and maybe even in life, is to become less afraid. Some boundaries are necessary of course and some are accepted, but the ones that I don’t want, I want to remove.”Willem DafoeUS, Actor
- “It’s important to say no – especially earlier in your career – because life is short and you want to be proud of things that you have done, not ashamed of them.”Peter DinklageUS, Actor
- “Of course we all do stupid things when we're young, but that's your way to find boundaries, you know. Have I done stupid things I regret? Yeah. But I can learn from those mistakes and grow. That's what it’s all about.”LeBron JamesUS, Basketball Player