The Howard Hughes I knew began to change after his plane crash in 1941.

I was married to someone who wanted me to change. Become more adult more responsible. I began not to like myself not like what I do. I lost my identity. Everything began collapsing around me.

In high school during marathon phone conversations cheap pizza dinners and long suburban car rides I began to fall for boys because of who they actually were or at least who I thought they might become.

After wrestling with myself for six months I began medical treatment. During that time I started a band with some friends of mine called Jack's Car but that didn't last.

The driver of a racing car is a component. When I first began I used to grip the steering wheel firmly and I changed gear so hard that I damaged my hand.

As soon as I began to earn what might be called fairly large sums I bought a car and began to explore the country around New York.

That's why I began doing makeup in the first place: I was hoping that through helping people see the beauty in themselves I could try and find it in me.

Sid Vicious began the age of participation in which everyone could be the artist. Sid proved that you don't have to play well to be the star. You can play badly or not even at all. I endorsed that attitude. If you can't write songs no problem - simply steal one and change it to your taste.

Galleries began growing in both number and size in the late seventies when artists who worked in lofts wanted to exhibit their work in spaces similar to the ones the art was made in.

I probably spent the first 20 years of my life wanting to be as American as possible. Through my 20s and into my 30s I began to become aware of how so much of my art and architecture has a decidedly Eastern character.

It was at Bell Labs that I first made direct contact with real semiconductor experts and thus began to fully understand what amazing materials they were and what they could do.

My acting career began at age three and my parents got me into it. I was in a McDonald's commercial.

I began to understand my sensations to know what I wanted at around the age of forty - but only vaguely.

I began to speak well at a very advanced age - 15 16 17 years old. It was psychological: the trauma of war my family and growing up on my own. I was more or less a street kid.

I saw no African people in the printed and illustrated Sunday school lessons. I began to suspect at this early age that someone had distorted the image of my people. My long search for the true history of African people the world over began.