New York is what Paris was in the twenties. . . the center of the art world. And we want to be in the center. It's the greatest place on earth. . . I've got a lot of friends here and I even brought my own cash.

News conference in Chicago, where he apologized for the above statement, which was accepted by the Vatican. (11 August 1966)

Art is only a way of expressing pain.

Everybody's talking about ministers, sinisters, banisters, and canisters, bishops, fishops, rabbis, and popeyes, bye-bye, bye-byes.

All kids draw and write poetry and everything, and some of us last until we're about eighteen, but most drop off at about twelve when some guy comes up and says, "You're no good." That's all we get told all our lives. "You haven't got the ability. You're a cobbler." It happened to all of us, but if somebody had told me all my life, "Yeah, you're a great artist," I would have been a more secure person.

After The Beatles came on the scene everyone started putting on a Liverpudlian accent.

I'm not a god or the God, but we're all God and we're all potentially divine - and potentially evil. We all have everything within us and the Kingdom of Heaven is nigh and within us, and if you look hard enough you'll see it.