A painstaking course in qualitative and quantitative analysis by John Wing gave me an appreciation of the need for and beauty of accurate measurement.

Music as many people have said is the universal language. Of course points are made which make you think about things but ultimately it makes you feel. And that's why people remember more songs that have meant something during their life than films. They start to define periods in your life and that's kind of the beauty of it.

I am obsessed with beauty. I want everything to be perfect and of course it isn't. And that's a tough place to be because you're never satisfied.

I want of course peace grace and beauty. How do you do that? You work for it.

The money is in a different league these days of course but I have special memories of the 60s and 70s which players today don't have. There wasn't the same celebrity attitude and media exposure. We had a bit more freedom.

I failed the LSAT. Basically if I had not failed I'd have been a lawyer and there would be no Spanx. I think failure is nothing more than life's way of nudging you that you are off course. My attitude to failure is not attached to outcome but in not trying. It is liberating.

That term's definitely got a negative aura to it because people think a diva is somebody with an attitude who demands things all the time. Of course there is that type of diva but my idea of a diva has always been a singer - whether male or female - who gets on that stage and captivates you with their presence and their voice.

I think failure is nothing more than life's way of nudging you that you are off course. My attitude to failure is not attached to outcome but in not trying. It is liberating. Most people attach failure to something not working out or how people perceive you. This way it is about answering to yourself.

Shadows sometimes people don't see shadows. The Chinese of course never paint them in pictures oriental art never deals with shadow. But I noticed these shadows and I knew it meant it was sunny.

Art is like a border of flowers along the course of civilization.

Of course art world ethics are important. But museums are no purer than any other institution or business. Academics aren't necessarily more high-minded than gallerists.

Nature scarcely ever gives us the very best for that we must have recourse to art.

What an artist is trying to do for people is bring them closer to something because of course art is about sharing. You wouldn't be an artist unless you wanted to share an experience a thought.

I started to make a study of the art of war and revolution and whilst abroad underwent a course in military training. If there was to be guerrilla warfare I wanted to be able to stand and fight with my people and to share the hazards of war with them.

Fashion is only the attempt to realize art in living forms and social intercourse.

But after the time there I'd had it with fashion again so I left to go to architecture school in a summer course at Harvard which didn't last very long.

That Moorish architecture is all over the place of course. It affects me everywhere I see it as it does so many people. But Brand Library was a special place to me and I know I've paid homage to it many times in my drawings.