Photography brought a lot to painting because it forced artists to think about what painting could do that photography couldn't.

When I first travelled to New York in 1982 on a summer holiday as a student, I remember thinking how exciting it was, how energising it felt, and also how it felt dangerous - it was a place where you could make a wrong turn, either geographically or just in a human interaction, and suddenly find yourself in trouble.

I grew up abroad, and when I first passed through London in the 1970s, it seemed a drab and provincial place.

John Lanchester Quotes