If I stretch my arms and wonder where my fingers are - that is all the space I need as a painter.

The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all your time.

I have to change to stay the same.

The attitude that nature is chaotic and that the artist puts order into it is a very absurd point of view, I think. All that we can hope for is to put some order into ourselves.

I don't paint to live, I live to paint.

What you do when you paint, you take a brush full of paint, get paint on the picture, and you have faith.

The drawings that interest me most are made with closed eyes. With eyes closed, I feel my hand slide down on the paper. I have an image in mind, but the results always surprise me.

Whatever an artist's personal feelings are, as soon as an artist fills a certain area on the canvas or circumscribes it, he becomes historical. He acts from or upon other artists.

It's really absurd to make... a human image, with paint, today, when you think about it... But then all of a sudden, it was even more absurd not to do it.

I might work on a painting for a month, but it has too look like I painted it in a minute.

Spiritually I am wherever my spirit allows me to be, and that is not necessarily in the future... Art never seems to make me peaceful or pure.

Indeed the safest road to Hell is the gradual one—the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts,

If we expect to inherit the blessings of our Fathers, we should return a little more to their primitive Simplicity of Manners.

When people aren't expecting to be seen, they look their truest.

I remember the very first suit I bought. It was a three-piece denim suit with bell-bottoms.

I myself have been on my own and utterly independent since I graduated. I haven't belonged to any company or any system. It isn't easy to live like this in Japan.

How wealthy the gods would be if we remembered the promises we made when we were in danger.

Drag wasn't always counterculture.

I have a 12-year-old daughter, and all the time people will say, 'Oh, she's young!" and you'd be so surprised what you can learn from that 12-year-old if you just opened up your mind.

Why do three-quarters of NATO [countries] get away with not paying anything? They have to pay their bills.

You gonna keep staring at me, Great Acheron, or are you ready to chew me a new one?