The big catalyst was seeing my sister, when I was 11, doing a dramatic recital. When I saw her on the stage and everyone listening to her so patiently, quietly, that's all I wanted: for someone to look at me and listen to me, but in some beautiful and artistic way.

Art is a habit-forming drug. Art has absolutely no existence as veracity, as truth. People always speak of it with this great, religious reverence, but why should it be so revered?

I think what really stays with me is the idea that you can write music about the texture of a wall, and everything is in some way connected.

You should play with real musicians; the best music comes from real people interacting with each other.

There is no reason to design buildings that are more basic and rectilinear, because with concrete you can cover almost any space.

It is the duty of the younger Negro artist . . . to change through the force of his art that old whispering "I want to be white," hidden in the aspirations of his people, to "Why should I want to be white? I am a Negro - and beautiful!"