There are no hidden depths to me.
— Charles Saatchi
Many people cycle or swim to keep trim. But if swimming is so good for the figure, how do you explain whales?
Few people in contemporary art demonstrate much curiosity. The majority spend their days blathering on, rather than trying to work out why one artist is more interesting than another, or why one picture works and another doesn't.
My dark little secret is that I don't actually believe many people in the art world have much feeling for art.
I find the theatre faintly embarrassing for the actors performing on stage. It seems rather showy-off in an undignified way.
I spoil my children rotten and hope to leave them enough so they can do the same to theirs.
I can't write. I can handle bits of simple-minded advert copy or a poster slogan, so answering questions is about all I'm good for.
I don't buy art just to make artists happy any more than I want to make them sad if I sell their work.
By and large, talent is in such short supply that mediocrity can be taken for brilliance rather more than genius can go undiscovered.
I have spent too long being able to manipulate the answers I want from market research to rely upon its findings any more than I do weather forecasts.
If, like me, you have many reasons to be less than secure and self-assured, and like me, you are far from stable even on your best days, don't for a moment imagine a psychotherapist will be of more help than a physiotherapist.
I don't know very many people in the art world, only socialise with the few I like, and have little time to gnaw my nails with anxiety about any criticism I hear about.
My aim in life isn't so much the pursuit of happiness as the happiness of pursuit.
I may not be much good at most things, but if I didn't have the pleasure of planning and installing shows, and doing it better than anyone else, I would have stopped buying art many years ago.
I have made so many mistakes, and such really stupid ones, I would start blubbing away if I could remember even half of them. But do not dwell on cock-ups, I say. You don't learn by your mistakes - at least I don't - so best to blunder on making fresh ones.
Some people in the art world bemoan the hedge fund millionaires spending freely to acquire ostentatious displays of wealth and coolth for their giddily chic designer duplexes. Others bemoan art being treated as a commodity. But most of the bemoaning is because the art world is stuffed full of bemoaners, bemoaning about everything.
Artists need a lot of collectors, all kinds of collectors, buying their art.
It's obvious nonsense, but it makes nice people feel good about themselves to do their bit for the planet. It's vanity of a grotesque kind to believe that mankind, and our 'carbon footprint', has more impact on the future of Earth than Nature, which bends our planet to its will, as it sees fit.
I've heard that almost all the people crowding around the big art openings barely look at the work on display and are just there to hobnob. Nothing wrong with that, except that none of them ever come back to look at the art - but they will tell everyone, and actually believe, that they have seen the exhibition.
Artistic credentials are au courant in the important business of being seen as cultured, elegant and, of course, stupendously rich.
I don't like clothes shopping and trying on outfits in stuffy cubicles in men's shops, looking hideous in the wrap-round mirrors, is something I attempt as seldom as possible.
I have asked to have no funeral, and no memorial service. I hate other people's and would certainly not appreciate my own.
I have never cared enough about money to worry about spending it, and have been fortunate to make enough to be spoiled rotten.
I hate to sound like a romantic adolescent, but I believe artists don't generally see art as a career choice; they simply can't overcome their desire to make art, and will live on little income for as long as they have to, before they start to sell their work - or give up and get a paying job.
Art collectors are pretty insignificant in the scheme of things. What matters and survives is the art. I buy art that I like. I buy it to show it off in exhibitions. Then, if I feel like it, I sell it and buy more art.
