I don't think I am going to do pictures which are anything like Renaissance art.

I also photographed Maggie Cheung - but these didn't develop into a friendship either.

There are ways of angling the camera. I don't just use a tripod. The only time I did that was in '88 when I first came out of detox, I spent every day doing self-portraits to fit back into my own skin. I didn't know what the world looked like - what I looked like - so in order to fit back into myself, I took self-portraits everyday to give myself courage and to fit the pieces back together. I used a tripod then.

My desire is to preserve the sense of people’s lives, to endow them with the strength and beauty I see in them. I want the people in my pictures to stare back.

I know somewhat about Kate [Moss who featured in the Vogue spread]. I always thought that Kate's look had come from my old friend Siobhan Liddell and some of her friends because they dressed like that about ten years ago. Unconsciously, and right after that, that whole look sort of came out.

I never courted that but it's nice when it's people you respect and they respect your work. It's thrilling.

I'm very flattered when people I respect like my work. It's like a dream of a little kid when somebody I idolised likes my work.