I am isolated as an artist, not as a person.

When I finish a painting, it usually looks as surprising to me as to anyone else.

I find old copies of National Gallery catalogues, which are written in the dryest possible prose, infinitely soothing.

I am happy for people to talk about my pictures, but I wish devoutly that I was not expected to talk about them myself.

My language is what I use, and if I lost that, I wouldnt be able to say anything.

You keep on balancing and balancing and balancing until the picture wins, because then the subject's turned into the picture.

The picture surface recedes just as much in the 20th century as it did in the 15th. The techniques of making pictures have hardly changed.