With the death of Robert Mapplethorpe, I had lost my main collaborator in taking photographs. So I didn't know who to work with.

People need space to air out their thoughts, to have a sense of themselves - unfettered by anything.

As I grew up, one of my strongest allies has been my sister.

I worked for Hillary [Clinton] when I was young - when she was running for the Senate. I was fundraising and things, I see all of these people as political in a way that isn't humanistic. I'm just watching and hoping that someone is going to distinguish himself or herself as comprehending what we need.

It's Steven's [Sebring] view of what he saw in traveling and working with me. But on another scale, I think the film [Dream of Life] is very humanistic: It touches on motherhood, death, birth, art, laundry, anger against the Bush administration... While I don't think it's the kind of film where one goes to find some of the darker, edgier aspects of life, the film was born of grief.

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.

Where does it all lead? What will become of us? These were our young questions, and young answers were revealed. It leads to each other. We become ourselves.