Many painters had a clear idea of what fractals are. Take a French classic painter named Poussin. Now, he painted beautiful landscapes, completely artificial ones, imaginary landscapes. And how did he choose them? Well, he had the balance of trees, of lawns, of houses in the distance. He had a balance of small objects, big objects, big trees in front and his balance of objects at every scale is what gives to Poussin a special feeling.

In fact, I barely missed being number one in France in both schools. In particular I did very well in mathematical problems.

When people ask me what's my field? I say, on one hand, a fractalist. Perhaps the only one, the only full-time one.

If you look at a shape like a straight line, what's remarkable is that if you look at a straight line from close by, from far away, it is the same; it is a straight line.

Pictures were completely eliminated from mathematics; in particular when I was young this happened in a very strong fashion.

I don't seek power and do not run around

I didn't want to become a pure mathematician, as a matter of fact, my uncle was one, so I knew what the pure mathematician was and I did not want to be a pure - I wanted to do something different.