I begin painting and as I paint the picture begins to assert itself, or suggest itself, under my brush. The form becomes a sign for a woman or a bird as I work... The first stage is free, unconscious... the second stage is carefully calculated.

When I stand before a canvas, I never know what I'll do, and I am the first one surprised at what comes out.

The more I work, the more I want to work.

Painting must be fertile. It must give birth to a world.. ..it must fertilize the imagination.

What I am looking for... is an immobile movement, something which would be the equivalent of what is called the eloquence of silence, or what St. John of the Cross, I think it was, described with the term 'mute music'.

You can look at a picture for a week and never think of it again. You can also look at the picture for a second and think of it all your life.

For me, a painting must give off sparks. It must dazzle like the beauty of a woman or a poem.