“Whoever wants to know something about me – as an artist which alone is significant – they should look attentively at my pictures and there seek to recognise what I am and what I want.”

Art is a line around your thoughts.

Even when I have to write a simple letter I’m scared stiff as if faced with looming seasickness.

There is no self-portrait of me.

There is nothing that special to see when looking at me. I’m a painter who paints day in day out, from morning till evening – figure pictures and landscapes, more rarely portraits.

After tea it’s back to painting – a large poplar at dusk with a gathering storm. From time to time instead of this evening painting session I go bowling in one of the neighbouring villages, but not very often.

True relaxation, which would do me the world of good, does not exist for me.

There is nothing that special to see when looking at me.

There is always hope, as long as the canvases are empty.

Although even when I am being idle I have plenty of food for thought both early and late – thoughts both about and not about art.

On my first days here I did not start work immediately but, as planned, I took it easy for a few days – flicked through books, studied Japanese art a little.

I can paint and draw. I believe this myself and a few other people say that they believe this too. But I’m not certain of whether it’s true.

Sometimes I miss out the morning’s painting session and instead study my Japanese books in the open.

The theory of the permanent revolution, in contradiction to the theory of socialism in one country, was recognized by the entire Bolshevik party during the period from 1917 to 1923.

The love of money as a possession. Will be recognised for what it is, a somewhat disgusting morbidity.

To preserve the human race, it is now necessary to reorganize society. To this end, an Authority must be created with the power to control human population, to redistribute food, to purify air, water, soil, to re-pattern the cities.

Children not only have to learn what their parents learned in school, but also have to learn how to learn. This has to be recognized as a new problem which is only partly solved.

Since I was a schoolboy, I’ve been used to being recognized on the road by old and young, and being bantered with and, indeed, being taunted.

We must recognize that beneath the superficial classifications of sex and race the same potentialities exist, recurring generation after generation, only to perish because society has no place for them.

Often we pass beside happiness without seeing it, without looking at it, or even if we have seen and looked at it, without recognizing it.

If that many people recognize how hard I go every night and what I put into my game, to make myself and my team better, it means a lot to me. I’m fortunate; I’m blessed to be in the situation that I’m in right now.