In the end I'm in love with it [Western European easel painting]. And that's where a lot of the influence from the work comes from.

I think there's something important in going against the grain, and perhaps finding value in things that aren't necessarily institutionally recognized.

This is something that, as artists, we constantly deal with-throwing away the past, slaying the father, and creating the new. This desire to throw away the old rules.

The backgrounds by design are a very key part of the conversation, because I want a kind of fight or pressure to exist between the figure and the background.

All art is self-portraiture.

Painting is situational. And my particular situation exists within gender, race, class, sexuality, nation.

I believe that artists should be part of the culture. I think that my work clearly bears that out.

The art world has become so insular. The rules have become so autodidactic that, in a sense, they lose track of what people have any interest in thinking about, talking about or even looking at.

We have a lot of sort of received historical ways of viewing portraiture. And I suppose in some way I'm sort of questioning that by toying with the rules of the game.

We're wired to be empathetic and to care about the needs of others, but also to be curious about others. And I think that's just sort of in our DNA. And so portraiture is a very human act.

I guess art is in the eye of the beholder.

In the early morning on the lake sitting in the stern of the boat with his father rowing, he felt quite sure that he would never die.

We are not supposed to be all equal. Let's just forget that. We are supposed to have equal rights under law. If we do that, we have done enough.

The daily lesson of slum life, visualised, reiterated, of low standards, vile living, obscenity, profanity, impurity, is bound tobe dwarfing and debasing to the children who are in the midst of it.

The return makes one love the farewell.

Life's a lottery, and man should make up his mind to the blanks.

There's only one way to break the color line. Be good. I mean, play good. Play so good that they can't remember what color you were before the season started.

In order to master the unruly torrent of life the learned man meditates, the poet quivers, and the political hero erects the fortress of his will.

Anybody who was easily converted was not worth converting.

Working at a job that you hate. Having a career and a life that you have no passion for. That's hell.

God has put me in a really good position where I can make the choices to walk away if something is not right, so that way I can keep my integrity.