The State has but one face for me: that of the police. To my eyes, all of the State's ministries have this single face, and I cannot imagine the ministry of culture other than as the police of culture, with its prefect and commissioners.

I had given up ( around 1950, fh) any ambition of making a career as an artist…..I had lost all interest in the art shown in galleries and museums, and I no longer aspired to fit in that world. I loved the paintings done by children, and my only desire was to do the same for my own pleasure.

Art must make you laugh a little and make you a little afraid. Anything as long as it doesn't bore.

When I want to draw a camel I no longer limit myself, as I once did, to looking only at camels.

For me, insanity is super sanity. The normal is psychotic. Normal means lack of imagination, lack of creativity.

What I expect from any work of art is that it surprises me, that it violates my customary valuations of things and offers me other, unexpected ones.

The real function of art is to change mental patterns ... making new thought possible.