I actually think the deafness makes you see clearer. If you can't hear, you somehow see.

Drawing makes you see things clearer, and clearer and clearer still, until your eyes ache.

Most artists work all the time, they do actually, especially good artists, they work all the time, what else is there to do? I mean you do.

And then I went round the corner and there's a Van Gogh portrait, and you just think, well, this is another level. A higher level, actually. I love the Sargent, but it's not the level of Van Gogh.

Who's going to ask a painter to see a diploma? They'd say, 'Can I see your paintings?', wouldn't they?

We live in an age where the artist is forgotten. He is a researcher. I see myself that way.