Angelo Corrao was our editor [in Dream of Life], and he was just so diligent and so old-school in the way he looked at editing. He would take my far-out ideas and tame them and make sense of them.

Because the filming process was so organic and there was no script, the film [Dream of Life] was literally telling us what it wanted to be in the editing room.

I just wanted to be Patti's [Smith] messenger and get her word out there.

Sometimes my fashion pictures can look a little bit like documentary style pictures. So having a camera in my hand was normal.

For me, moving from photography to film was very easy.

Fashion has also been a great outlet, and I'd like to do more fashion photography in the future. I also photograph a lot of artists.

Fashion's been really good to me. It financed Patti Smith: Dream of Life.

I didn't do well in high school, but I took photography, and I loved being able to capture moments.

Many of my family members are teachers in the arts, and I picked up the camera years ago, in high school.

I never went to film school, so I just sort of learned on my own.

Patti [Smith] was my experiment, to be honest. And the film is what we got out of it. At the end of the day, I learned a lot about how to make a film.

A man is not idle because he is absorbed in thought. There is a visible labour and there is an invisible labour.

What you need to remember is that there’s a difference between lecturing about what you know and using it to enrich the story. The latter is good. The former is not.

But love's a malady without a cure.

Thousands of people have tried, and the evidence is clear: The more you trade, the less you keep.

What use was money if you didn't have the time to enjoy it?

I had this great urge... I had it the day I was born. Some may call it destiny. My parents and friends called it dismaying.

Fashion is general. Style is individual.

I can't turn your soul on. Leave me those feelings; and you can take away the voice and the face. They are not you.

When you're in show business no matter what you're doing it's an insecure business.

We may be the protagonists of tragedy, but we are also the heroes of our most beautiful and thrilling experiences.