“Style is a simple way of saying complicated things.”

When I write, I disturb. When I show a film, I disturb. When I exhibit my painting, I disturb, and I disturb if I don’t. I have a knack for disturbing.

The artist is a kind of prison from which the works of art escape.

A true photographer is as rare as a true poet or a true painter.

Whatever the world condemns you for, make it your own. It is yourself.

The public is never pleased with what we do, wanting always a copy of what we have done.

The job of the poet (a job which can’t be learned) consists of placing those objects of the visible world which have become invisible due to the glue of habit, in an unusual position which strikes the soul and gives them a tragic force.

Such is the role of poetry. It unveils, in the strict sense of the word. It lays bare, under a light which shakes off torpor, the surprising things which surround us and which our senses record mechanically.

We must believe in luck. For how else can we explain the success of those we don’t like?

Poetry, being elegance itself, cannot hope to achieve visibility… It insists on living its own life.

Art is a marriage of the conscious and the unconscious.

I only fear the death of others. For me, true death is that of the people I love.

I have a piece of great and sad news to tell you: I am dead.

Poetry is a religion with no hope.

Art is science in the flesh.

Fight any instinct to be humorless, for humorlessness is the worst of all absurdities.

Man seeks to escape himself in myth, and does so by any means at his disposal. Drugs, alcohol, or lies. Unable to withdraw into himself, he disguises himself. Lies and inaccuracy give him a few moments of comfort.

Making a film is like putting out a fire with sieve. There are so many elements, and it gets so complicated.

If anyone tries to complicate your life, turn and walk away from them.

When everything in life gets so complicated it only takes a day to change it.

Avoidance. Probably the worst dance. – Complicated.

In performing experiments, it is necessary… that they be simplified as much as possible, and that every circumstance that could complicate the results should be completely removed.

Just one living cell in the human body is, more complex than New York City.

The art of drawing conclusions from experiments and observations consists in evaluating probabilities and in estimating whether they are sufficiently great or numerous enough to constitute proofs. This kind of calculation is more complicated and more difficult than it is commonly thought to be.

It is essential to understand our brains in some detail if we are to assess correctly our place in this vast and complicated universe we see all around us.