Black ink was always my favorite. I loved it. And then one day I realized that the only thing I ever wanted to do was to paint.

It's what I do that teaches me what I'm looking for.

Painting isn't just pretty or pleasant; it is something that helps you to stand alone and face yourself.

If painting doesn't offer a way to dream and create emotions, then it's not worth it.

Painting is a play of opacities and transparencies.

For me, it's important to experience aesthetic shock, which sets in motion our imagination, our emotions, our feelings, and our thoughts. That's the purpose of a painting and of art in general.

I realized that most people waste their lives earning a living, and I wanted to live. I love painting, so I keep painting. That's how I became an artist.

I never want to stop painting. I'm 94 now. What's my secret? I just keep thinking about the painting I'm going to do tomorrow.

I am against limitations like perspective. Perspective is illusion, it's the opposite of presence, and art is presence.

Prehistoric art came to move me much more than Greek art. Greek art has beautiful women and handsome men, but I don't care.

I always liked paintings to be walls rather than windows. When we see a painting on a wall, it's a window, so I often put my paintings in the middle of the space to make a wall.

I am afraid because I can so clearly foresee my own life rotting away of itself, like a leaf that rots without falling, while I pursue my round of existence from day to day.

Nothing so conclusively proves a man's ability to lead others as what he does from day to day to lead himself.

Liberal learning is both a safeguard against false ideas of freedom and a source of true ones.

Bodhidharma who brought Zen from India to the Orient, taught a very pure Zen - in that it was pure Zen. He wanted to show that the way still existed and wanted to get back to its essence.

I think most people live in fiction...That's how you keep your fragile body intact.

Fond man! though all the heroes of your line Bedeck your halls, and round your galleries shine In proud display; yet take this truth from me-- Virtue alone is true nobility!

Good weather all the week, but come the weekend the weather stinks. When the weather is too hot they complain, too cold they complain, and when it's just right, they're watching TV.

In my experience tact is usually worse than the brutalities of truth.

People get desperate when they're backed into a corner.

My art side is free and there are no strings attached.