Bement was a very good teacher but he was a very poor painter. I guess he wasn't a painter at all. He had no courage and I believe that to create one's own world in any of the arts takes courage.

I have painted portraits that to me are almost photographic. I remember hesitating to show the paintings, they looked so real to me. But they have passed into the world as abstractions - no one seeing what they are.

I have things in my head that are not like what anyone has taught me - shapes and ideas so near to me - so natural to my way of being and thinking that it hasn't occurred to me to put them down.

It's not enough to be nice in life. You've got to have nerve.

I've been absolutely terrified every moment of my life - and I've never let it keep me from doing a single thing I wanted to do.

There's something about black. You feel hidden away in it.

I don't know what Art is but I know some things it isn't when I see them.