It took me 11 years to struggle through one dumb book, and every day you just want to give up. But you don't find out you're an artist because you do something really well.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
You just have to know that the more successful you get as an artist, the less of a normal life you have. It's a trade-off.
My whole premise has been, right from the beginning, that it would take me a lifetime to learn to explain myself as an artist. As you grow older, you learn what to do and what to leave out. You kind of simplify your work and get the same thing done with fewer strokes. It's pretty interesting to me.
What drives me is to still feel creative and like I'm pushing myself as an artist.
I'm an artist, and the need to get inside myself and be creative and be other people is a part of who I am. I don't imagine I'll abandon that completely.
Part of being an artist is that you are always concerned you don't have what it takes. It... keeps us honest.
I think it's harder than ever to be an artist. I think that you end up, especially as a middle-aged person, you pay such big consequences for saying, 'I'm just going to devote my life to making art,' or 'I'm going to devote my life to writing novels.' You end up with no resources.
I always knew that I was an artist. I never expected to be able to make a living.
One of the greatest things about being an artist is, as you get older, if you keep working hard in relationship to what you want the world to be and how you want it to become, there is a history of interesting growth that resonates with different moments in your life.
I make a good living and I've never looked at myself as being an artiste.
To be an artist you have to give up everything, including the desire to be a good artist.