At art school, a teacher said: 'The best paintings are when you get lost in a piece of work and start painting in a stream of consciousness.' I wanted to do music, not art, so started writing lyrics that way. The first song I wrote was called 'Ice Cream and Wafers.' The next was 'Holding Back the Years.'

A real work of art destroys, in the consciousness of the receiver, the separation between himself and the artist.

Art keeps me alive. I've obviously been devastated or heartbroken all my life, since my mother's death.

Art is the perpetual motion of illusion. The highest purpose of art is to inspire. What else can you do? What else can you do for anyone but to inspire them?

The purpose of art is to stop time.

Art is about building a new foundation, not just laying something on top of what's already there.