My parents are both college professors, and it made me want to question authority, standards and traditions.

A lot of my works deal with a passage, which is about time. I don't see anything that I do as a static object in space. It has to exist as a journey in time.

My grandfather, on my father's side, helped to draft one of the first constitutions of China. He was a fairly well-known scholar.

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 was probably the first kid in my high school to go to Yale. I applied almost as a lark. Then, when I got there, I was the dumbest person in your class.

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

Some artists want to confront. Some want to invoke thought. They're all necessary and they're all valid.