In my day artists wanted to be outcasts, pariahs. Now they are all integrated into society

Society takes what it wants. The artist himself does not count, because there is no actual existence for the work of art. The work of art is always based on the two poles of the onlooker and the maker, and the spark that comes from the bipolar action gives birth to something - like electricity. But the onlooker has the last word, and it is always posterity that makes the masterpiece. The artist should not concern himself with this, because it has nothing to do with him.

In my day artists wanted to be outcasts, pariahs. Now they are all integrated into society

The life of an artist is like the life of a monk, a lewd monk if you like, very Rabelaisian. It is an ordination.

What I have in mind is that art may be bad, good or indifferent, but, whatever adjective is used, we must call it art, and bad art is still art in the same way that a bad emotion is still an emotion.

You cannot define electricity. The same can be said of art. It is a kind of inner current in a human being, or something which needs no definition.

The only thing that is not art is inattention