I think that's kind of indicative of a type of self-confidence that people develop when they recognize their own ability to create.

Mel [Bochner] sets a very high standard. He expects only the best and most thoughtful and rigorous examinations, not only of the history of art but your own practice.

For me, I wanted to create something that's much more driven by a type of selfishness, a type of decadence.

I mean, the radical contingency that is - that exists and the fact that I'm going into the streets and finding random strangers any given day - who's in these streets that day?

I was surrounded by art by virtue of not only the educational opportunities that my mother's foresight availed me to.

Like, the smells and the sights and the sounds. As an artist, you want to sort of be able to engage that and get that down in some way. This is - this is a type of familiarity but a type of radical difference at the same time.

I think that at its best, painting can be an act of juggling perceptions, a hall of mirrors. And it can be a bit confusing and scattering. But as the artist, as the man behind the velvet rope who controls the smoke and the mirrors and the way that things move in the painted space, what I want to do is to try my best to be a good witness.