Sometimes you have to stop thinking. Sometimes you shut down completely. I think that's true in any creative field.

I deliberately did not read anything about the Vietnam War because I felt the politics of the war eclipsed what happened to the veterans. The politics were irrelevant to what this memorial was.

I like to think of my work as creating a private conversation with each person, no matter how public each work is and no matter how many people are present

We were unusually brought up; there was no gender differentiation. I was never thought of as any less than my brother.

Art is very tricky because it's what you do for yourself. It's much harder for me to make those works than the monuments or the architecture.

I also wanted remembering the past relevant to the present. Some people wanted me to put the names in alphabetical order. I wanted them in chronological order so that a veteran could find his time within the panel. It's like a thread of life.

I cannot force a design; I do not see this process as being under my conscious control.