I was recently interviewed for radio in relation to the "Thanksgiving" show [2001] at the Saatchi gallery that I was part of. The interviewer said that people in London were very disturbed that I showed a picture of myself battered ("Nan One Month after Being Battered", 1984) and they thought that I set it up. I was accused of deliberately putting on a wig for that particular picture.

For me it is not a detachment to take a picture. It's a way of touching somebody - it's a caress… I think that you can actually give people access to their own soul.

My life there[in New York] was almost entirely about gay men for 30 years.

I never thought heroin was very chic.

I just get inspired to take a picture by the beauty and vulnerability of my friends.

The main thing that I want to say is that I don't think women are at their most beautiful in their adolescence or in their early 20s.

The complete disregard for the camera's presence indicates its complete saturation in their lives. The subject neither notices nor seems to care that someone has been invited into their private moment.