I will always find even the worst paintings that attempt some kind of representation better than the best invented paintings.

Painting is a language which cannot be replaced by another language. I don't know what to say about what I paint, really.

Painting what I experience, translating what I feel, is a great liberation. But it is also work, self-examination, consciousness, criticism, struggle.

Painting is the passage from the chaos of the emotions to the order of the possible.

The best way to begin is to say: 'Balthus is a painter of whom nothing is known. And now let us have a look at the paintings'.

If you speak of beauty, you are at once suspected of...kitsch.

I will always find even the worst paintings that attempt some kind of representation better than the best invented paintings.