If you're going to go for 'it' you have a common thing you share with other artists; that's desperation. You jump out a window style-wise. Try to put it together before you hit the ground.

Picasso and Matisse were the guys I wanted to get away from, and cubism is all still lifes. Their paintings are all closed drawings. And still life is a perfect form for that. By the mid-'50s, I sort of dropped the still life. The large picture was a way of getting around them, too. The abstract expressionists were also into the large form because it was a way of getting around Matisse and Picasso. Picasso can't paint big paintings. Matisse didn't bother after a certain point.

Part of what Im about is seeing how I can paint the same thing differently instead of different things the same way.

Most important, for openers, work six hours a day, seven days a week for six years. Then if you like it you can get serious about it.

You usually want to get something out of a painting other than the ideas that you had in your head.

You have to find what your temperament is like and live around it. I find I work really well off the top of my head because you get the unconscious into it. Otherwise, it's just an idea. And I'm not so hot there.

Actually, you want to go into an area where you're frightened. Otherwise, you're just going to be repainting beautiful paintings, but a little duller each time.