I don't think about art when I'm working. I try to think about life.
I'm not a real person. I'm a legend.
I am not a black artist, I am an artist.
The black person is the protagonist in most of my paintings. I realized that I didn't see many paintings with black people in them.
I don't listen to what art critics say. I don't know anybody who needs a critic to find out what art is.
Some days I can't get an idea, and I think, 'Man, I'm just washed up,' but it's just a mood.
The more I paint the more I like everything.
I want to make paintings that look as if they were made by a child.
Believe it or not, I can actually draw.
I like kids' work more than work by real artists any day.
I was a really lousy artist as a kid. Too abstract expressionist; or I'd draw a big ram's head, really messy. I'd never win painting contests. I remember losing to a guy who did a perfect Spiderman.
I thought I was going to be a bum the rest of my life.
I wanted to be a star, not a gallery mascot.
I had some money, I made the best paintings ever. I was completely reclusive, worked a lot, took a lot of drugs. I was awful to people.
There are about 30 words around you all the time, like 'thread' or 'exit.'
Since I was seventeen I thought I might be a star. I'd think about all my heroes, Charlie Parker, Jimi Hendrix... I had a romantic feeling about how these people became famous.
I start a picture and I finish it.
The country makes me more paranoid, you know? I think the crazy people out there are little crazier.
I wanted to build up a name for myself.
Occasionally, when I get mad at a woman, I'll do some great, awful painting about her.
