Holding together a kind of tension. When you see a painting that's really good that's what it's doing.

When you're not smoking anymore, you don't have to carry around a pack of cigarettes, a lighter - all this paraphernalia. So you're liberated in a certain sense. It's the same with drinking.

I love the healthy exchange of information.

Abstraction has always been around, since the drawings in the caves. It exists in all cultures all over the world. I thought for a while that it was going to be the major movement. But people always drift back to realism. I guess there is a certain security in that.

I respect all artists, just some more than the others. Because it's something that really needs to be done.

Western artists stand as humans looking at nature; Asian artists try to be in nature. You become one with nature rather than painting a portrait of it. That's a big shift.

I've always worn a hat when I work. I think it also comes from a picture of Rothko I saw with a painter's hat on.