My work is purely autobiographical... It is about myself and my surroundings.

Painting is sometimes like those recipes where you do all manner of elaborate things to a duck, and then end up putting it on one side and only using the skin.

The process of creation becomes necessary to the painter perhaps more than is the picture. The process in fact is habit-forming

The aura given out by a person or object is as much a part of them as their flesh. The effect that they make in space is as bound up with them as might be their colour or smell ... Therefore the painter must be as concerned with the air surrounding his subject as with the subject itself. It is through observation and perception of atmosphere that he can register the feeling that he wishes his painting to give out.

I don't want any colour to be noticeable... I don't want it to operate in the modernist sense as colour, something independent... Full, saturated colours have an emotional significance I want to avoid.

The model should only serve the very private function for the painter of providing the starting point for his excitement

Losing as much money as I can get hold of is an instant solution to my economic problems.