I do think I have an ability to record sensual and emotional facts and factoids, to construct a convincing surface of what life feels like, both physical life and emotional life.
I think poetry is the only domain where a writer you like can truly be said to influence you, because you read and reread a poem so many times that it simply drills itself into your head.
From a cognitive standpoint, I'm very aware that you have no room for error in a picture book. Every word counts.
Poetry's a thing that belongs to everyone.
I paint to evoke a changing language of symbols, a language with which to remark upon the qualities of our mysterious capacities which direct us toward ultimate reality.
It's very interesting how life imitates art, and art imitates life; I find, whenever I read scenes of some magnitude, I'm like, 'Oh, I feel like I've experienced this,' or 'I am experiencing this,' or 'I might start to experience it soon.'
There is no work of art that has ever been made that is absolutely truthful about life.
I accept all interpretations of my films. The only reality is before the camera. Each film I make is kind of a return to poetry for me, or at least an attempt to create a poem.
What's the function of poetry? It's to express general truths, to connect with the reader and make him think: 'Wow, I've experienced that, but you've expressed it so much better.'
In poetic language, in which the sign as such takes on an autonomous value, this sound symbolism becomes an actual factor and creates a sort of accompaniment to the signified.
A perfect poem you can't pin down and say, 'This is exactly what it meant to me.' It's not a self-help manual.
One thing that makes art different from life is that in art things have a shape... it allows us to fix our emotions on events at the moment they occur, it permits a union of heart and mind and tongue and tear.
I'm never interested in the painting being a mirror to culture. I think that's really boring. What I'm interested in is painting as an affective space. The place where the hierarchies of the world can be rearranged within the space of a painting. And they can be articulated in different ways.
