I had gone to Paris to immerse myself in painting and I came back wholly involved in words and rhythms.

My public life was so demanding that I wasn't doing the things that I deemed the most important.

The two things that constantly inspired me were books and travel.

Fate is like a secret friend that helps push you on into life.

You can't work on that scale without trust. I learned that from working with Robert Mapplethorpe.

I always wanted to be an artist, writer and poet since I was seven, and one has to live long enough to evolve as an artist and do one's finest work.

The moment of creative impulse is what an artist gives you. You look at a Pollock, and it can't give you the tools to do a painting like that yourself, but in doing the work, Pollock shares with you the moment of creative impulse that drove him to do that work.