But I was in awe of the painters; I mean I was new in New York, and I thought the painting that was going on here was just unbelievable

Screwing things up is a virtue. Being correct is never the point. I have an almost fanatically correct assistant, and by the time she re-spells my words and corrects my punctuation, I can't read what I wrote. Being right can stop all the momentum of a very interesting idea.

It is neither Art for Art, nor Art against Art. I am for Art, but for Art that has nothing to do with Art. Art has everything to do with life, but it has nothing to do with Art.

I don't want a picture to look like something it isn't. I want it to look like something it is.

And I think that even today, New York still has more of this unexpected quality around every corner than any place else. It's something quite extraordinary

One has to believe in what one is doing, one has to commit oneself inwardly, in order to do painting. Once obsessed, one ultimately carries it to the point of believing that one might change human beings through painting. But if one lacks this passionate commitment, there is nothing left to do. Then it is best to leave it alone.

There was a whole language that I could never make function for myself in relationship to painting, and that was attitudes like tortured, struggle, pain.