David Hockney

“It is very good advice to believe only what an artist does, rather than what he says about his work.”

“Most artists work all the time, they do actually, especially good artists, they work all the time, what else is there to do? I mean you do.”

“Tobacco is America's greatest gift to the world!”

“Picasso is still influencing me. Of course, I haven't got that kind of energy, or skill.”

“On the iPhone I tended to draw with my thumb. Whereas the moment I got to the iPad, I found myself using every finger.”

“I see the iPad as a wonderful new drawing medium, but I am at a loss as to how to make it pay.”

“I was always struck by how Picasso had no interest in music.”

“I'm very attracted to the great open spaces of the West.”

“I worked in the NHS as a hospital orderly during my national service, and people thought it was a noble service. But over the years it's lost its humanity.”

“I'm always excited by the unlikely, never by ordinary things.”

“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 s...”

“I paint what I like, when I like and where I like.”

“I think Picasso was, without doubt, the greatest portraitist of the 20th century, if not any other century.”

“I don't value prizes of any sort.”

“I'm a bit of a propagandist.”

“I was 18 when I first visited London, I'm very provincial like that, but I must confess the moment I got to America I thought: This is the place. It was more open, with 24-hour cities and pu...”

“People tell me they open my e-mails first, because they aren't demands and you don't need to reply. They're simply for pleasure.”

“We live in an age where the artist is forgotten. He is a researcher. I see myself that way.”

“I do do a lot of talking, because it saves me listening.”

“Britain is a very small country with a very large press.”