I've made several careers out of people underestimating me - it's almost an advantage worth cultivating.
I'm all for 'tools,' not 'schools,' of therapy. To me, the schools of therapy compete much like religions, or even cults, all claiming to know the cause and to have the best method for treating people.
The second is the structure and source of cults. They have always haunted me, and I wanted to explore the fundamental notion of giving up responsibility to an outside power.
Living through the intersections of cultural diversity has given me an intimate understanding of the dynamics of living between the dimensions of East and West, traditional and modern, and political and spiritual.
I'm turned on by guys who are cultured. That'll keep me intrigued. They don't have to have a single degree, but they should speak other languages or know things about other parts of the world or history or certain artists or musicians. I like to be taught. I like to sit on that side of the table.
Most of my relationships were people in the business. Having said that, me and Tim don't really talk that much about work. He comes into my bit of the house every so often to vent but we don't really have very high, cultured conversations.
The importance and influence of books on me has been cumulative: the result of hearing and reading lots of stories about interesting people and places.
Colin Cunningham just cracks me up.
A friend, Sean Cunningham, who went on to do 'Friday the 13th,' was given a small budget to produce a scary movie, and he told me to write something. I'd never seen a horror film in my life; I'd fallen in love with Fellini.
Coach Cunningham's my guy. Without me saying a word, he can read my body language and facial expressions and tell me exactly what I'm thinking and feeling. We're actually very similar people.
I'm not everybody's cup of tea. But sometimes criticism can be hurtful. Be respectful. I'm a good piano player, I can sing well, I write good songs. If you don't like it, fair enough. But give me a break.
When I was paralysed by polio at 13, I went into an isolation hospital and couldn't sit up, so I only took liquid food from spouted cups which the masked nurses would bring in and feed to me. I saw my parents only through glass; we couldn't touch.
I might want to open a hotel and design all the rooms. Or maybe a museum that lets me curate all the events.
I was at the Smithsonian for twenty years, and I'm still at the Smithsonian as a curator emeritus, and I still plan to figure out what that means for me at this point in my life.
I'm sure I would have been considered a more significant artist if I was a singer-songwriter. It's just not the way I roll. I love being a curator and a musicologist. People write me letters and thank me for turning them on to Fred McDowell and Sippie Wallace, and that's partly my job this time around.
I was doing an interview with a curator, and he asked me to sum up art in one word. Before he even finished asking the question, I said, 'Impurity.' Because that's it.
I don't really understand why people are so interested in me, personally. I'm just a curator. I'm just telling people things I think are cool.
The willed recovery of what's been lost - often forcibly, I suppose - is what keeps me going. It is this reason I found myself a poet and a collector and now a curator: to save what we didn't even know needed saving.
I was eight years old when I got the talk about what to do if a police officer stops me. I was 15 when I was face-down on the curb for the first time.
I'm not a Larry David. I don't have a 'Curb Your Enthusiasm' and a 'Seinfeld' in me.
