"But I'm more interested in why people are frightened by Jaws and why Jaws was such a hit than saying Spielberg's my main influence."

"There's no possible way you can get what you want."

"But the answer to how to live is to stop thinking about it. And just to live. But you're doing that anyway. However you intellectualise it, you still just live."

"The goal in life is to be solid, whereas the way that life works is totally fluid, so you can never actually achieve that goal."

"It's such a crass idea - you're either in love or out of love."

"Artists are like everybody else."

"I always ignore money."

"But whenever I look at the question of how to live, the answer's always staring me in the face. I'm already doing it."

"Most people live in the city and go to the country at the weekend, and that's posh and aristocratic, but actually to live in the country and come to London when you can't take it any more is different."

"I think suicide is the most perfect thing you can do in life."

"It'd be nice to make lots of money but it's quite difficult, because every time I make lots of money I make a bigger piece that costs lots of money."

"A lot of people thought I wasn't doing anything because I was spending a lot of time socialising and going out, but I've always managed to get work actually done."

"I always feel like the art's there and I just see it, so it's not really a lot of work."

"In an artwork you're always looking for artistic decisions, so an ashtray is perfect. An ashtray has got life and death."

"So smoking is the perfect way to commit suicide without actually dying. I smoke because it's bad, it's really simple."

"Immortality is really desirable, I guess. In terms of images, anyway."

"It's good to have a title that's not just one word. If you're gonna title it, you might as well try and say something."