We like to learn all we need from earlier generations, but we have to find out for ourselves what we need; nobody else can do that for us.

Everything is in constant flux, from state to state, from good to bad and back again... only in transmutation, perpetual motion, lies truth.

A creative train of thought is set off by: the unexpected, the unknown, the accidental, the disorderly, the absurd, the impossible.

We are not disillusioned because we have no illusions... What we have and what is our strength, is our joy in life... in all its amoral aspects. That is also the basis of our contemporary art.

Beautiful, ugly, impressive, disgusting, meaningless, grim, contradictory etc … It makes no difference, as long as it is life, vigorously pouring forth.

We are sparks that must glow as brightly as possible.

To break and be able to grow together again in a better way: that is the difficult art.

The significance of something lies in its presence here and now. I don't care what it has been or what it will become. It is the experience of things that matters, the confrontation with things.

Being an artist is being an isolated individual.

To make the material speak to man in the name of man, this is the aim and reality of art.

The artist's interest cannot be restricted to a single field; he must seek the highest perception of everything, of the whole and its details.

I lost my way in the darkness. But at dawn of a bright light, I find my path.

Sometimes I think I live more closely to the past than the present.

Do not underestimate the power of an enemy, no matter how great or small, to rise against you another day.

Whatever people say I am, I'm not.

the Bible is only as good and decent as the person reading it.

The several sorts of religion in the world are little more than so many spiritual monopolies.

Novelty serves us for a kind of refreshment, and takes off from that satiety we are apt to complain of in our usual and ordinary entertainments.

I hadn't planned on going to law school. I wanted to study 19th-century Russian literature.

I think everyone has the same question on their mind: Is the glass half-full or half-empty?