Status and class and social anxiety and perhaps social code are all released when you look at paintings of powerful individuals from the past.

This is something that, as artists, we constantly deal with-throwing away the past, slaying the father, and creating the new. This desire to throw away the old rules.

What it is is a type of editorialization, you know? This is self-portraiture. This is what you think about the world we live in.

Women are expected to identify gender as a starting point. Ethnicities are expected to identify that as a location. Is it ever possible for the artist to imagine a state of absolute freedom? That was my call to arms.

People who - and I think that's been a huge education for me. I think it's a - it's a privilege to be able to meet such a broad cross-section of New York and increasingly the world, and to get a feel of how people respond to visual culture.

There's something really cool about being able to fly to South Africa and watch one of the most talented African footballers wearing a shoe on the field.

There's always a tug of war. Like, in the States, in America, there's certainly a higher quotient, I would imagine, of, like, macho, like, masculinity posturing.