If someone who knows what's going on comes up and says they liked the music, I appreciate that.

When I was about 17 I knew that I was going to be serious about music. Before that I thought, fairly certainly, that I would be a writer. Before that, I thought I would be a forward in the NBA. And before that I thought that I would own a snake farm.

I feel cleaner on the days where I am painting as opposed to the periods when I am not, that is certain to me. In a sense it is a transfiguration, what comes at me in my life or what I see going on in the world comes out as something beautiful or hopefully beautiful.

I attempt to create a world that hypnotizes me as I make it. I hope others can get lost in it in the same way, but to be honest, I don't care that much. It isn't like a basketball player is out on the court hoping that people like the game of basketball as the game goes on. If people don't see it, they don't see it. It is a fragile thing and most people recognize that and respect it. Even if for whatever reason, they don't like the painting.

I have an idea of a set of colors and see what I have. A lot of things, the best, more magical things in the paintings just sort of happen. They aren't things I thought of in advance. They are more things I am given. What paint does, in watercolor more than oil but it happens in oil too, are things one never expects if you work freely. I suppose I learned a lot coming to this after years of playing improvisational music. I have to trust my intuition and I work in the moment, when that moment seems to be happening. And to leave it alone when it is not.

I'd always maintained an image so that people wouldn't approach me.

I think the Native Americans had the right idea about preserving and respecting the earth. Not just using it up. We are not the center of the universe and that we think we are will most likely be the end of us. Then nature will go on its way, with humans only being a faint ugly memory. And yes I am fond of animals or most of them.