Marina Abramovic

"I was friends with Susan Sontag the last four years of her life. She had this amazing charisma and so much energy, but she had a sad little funeral in Montparnasse in Paris."

"I was friends with Susan Sontag the last four years of her life. She had this amazing charisma and so much energy, but she had a sad little funeral in Montparnasse in Paris. It was rainy. It was all wrong. And I was thinking, 'God, she loved life so much.'"

"If you're a baker, making bread, you're a baker. If you make the best bread in the world, you're not an artist, but if you bake the bread in the gallery, you're an artist. So the context makes the difference."

"The function of the artist in a disturbed society is to give awareness of the universe, to ask the right questions, and to elevate the mind."

"The public is in need of experiences that are not just voyeuristic. Our society is in a mess of losing its spiritual centre."

"When I taught art, I was always asked, 'How do you know you're an artist? What makes you an artist?' And to me, it's like breathing. You don't question if you breathe; you have to breathe. So if you wake up in the morning, and you have to realize an idea, and there's another idea, and another, maybe you are really an artist."

"Your ego can become an obstacle to your work. If you start believing in your greatness, it is the death of your creativity."