I think artists should define themselves. They should speak about their work and how it relates to society and what's going on in the world.

Sometimes I'm not so sure how healthy it is because it's exhausting to put all your emotion into your work, but I guess I should be thankful for that. I don't want the work to be about anything else but the truth and honesty.

I have too much energy, even for myself. I'm lucky to have something that focuses me.

My work is an exploration of the self. I've always been concerned with how I'm living and how that reflects in the painting.

One teacher told me that my work belonged in the trash. That day I ran out of the classroom and ended up in the library, where there happened to be a black and white photography exhibition of Robert Rauschenberg's photographs of the streets of New York. The subject of his photos were exactly what I was painting about.

As a young kid I was in love with breakdancing. I practiced the uprock style, which is a battle style of dance that looks like fighting. It comes from the gangs in New York in the 1960s and '70s. It's beautiful, almost like a martial art, and it can be funny, too, because you make fun of each other.

Sometimes I'm inspired by a certain part of my life - I'm thinking about a place and I'll mix the colors from memory.