I'm actually embarrassed to tell people I'm Russian these days, because it's become such an awful place.

I think what inspires me is in a constant state of flux...it's easier to stick to photographers and perhaps cinematographers, though the great medieval, Mannerist, and Baroque painters of Italian, Spanish, Flemish, and German origin are a constant source of inspiration, along with select modernists like Dali.

I'm not passive aggressive. If something bothers me, I think about it, then I act on it. I express it.

In a relationship when things are really great you don't need to say anything and just enjoy the other person. Sometimes with a couple, it gets dark and you don't know what to say and that silence can last all day. Other times you don't want to stop talking because you don't want to lose one another.

Communism destroyed so many generations. I look at my grandparents and their generation, and it's as if their lives were taken from them. It's really sad and frightening that something like that could have happened. But I don't really think of myself as Russian anymore. I didn't even live there for that long.

Every relationship I've been in becomes long-distance because of work. It's never worked out. It puts an intense strain on the relationship, and at a certain point, it becomes too difficult.

I don't feel any connection to Russia.