I always feel a bit trapped when a painting goes for millions of pounds and only one person can have it. If you can have that as well as a poster on every student's wall, then you're in a very enviable position. I'd like to do a Damien Hirst for £500 at some point.

I have always been aware that you have to get people listening before you can change their minds. Any artist's big fear is being ignored, so if you get debate, that's great.

But whenever I look at the question of how to live, the answer's always staring me in the face. I'm already doing it.

I think an ashtray is the most fantastically real thing.

I think I've always been afraid of painting, really. Right from the beginning. All my paintings are about painting without a painter. Like a kind of mechanical form of painting. Like finding some imaginary computer painter, or a robot who paints.

I think suicide is the most perfect thing you can do in life.

Making art, good art, is always a struggle. It can make you happy when you pull it off. There's no better feeling. It's beauteous. But it's always about hard work and inspiration and sweat and good ideas.