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A work of art which did not begin in emotion is not art.

One of the reasons that art is important to me is sometimes it actually feels more coherent than life. It orders the chaos.

What we want from art is whatever is missing from the lives we are already living and making. Something is always missing, and so art-making is endless.

Art is much less important than life, but what a poor life without it.

Don't you know that every perfect life would mean the end of art?

I think art doesn't have to be created in a period of misery, but it certainly helps.

Art is lunging forward without certainty about where you are going or how to get there, being open to and dependent on what luck, the paint, the typo, the dissonance, give you. Without art you're stuck with yourself as you are and life as you think life is.

Unlike life, a work of art never gets taken for granted: it is always viewed against its precursors and predecessors.

The moment you think you understand a great work of art, it's dead for you.