— Oh baby, be for real. Just let it flow.
— Oh, Suzy, let me wrap you in your capes, your scarves. Let’s see, maybe I can mix la chicha y la limonada, el aceite y el vinagre. Carpe diem, come here.
— Take me. I’m here.
— Oh, Suzy, I’m drunk. I don’t know what I’m feeling. And I don’t know where my carpe diem is. Did it fly away with Poetic License. Surprise. I have a Halloween in Christmas and Halloween in Easter. And ubi sunt regrets: where is it? I’m here. Don’t listen, I’m drunk. But more drunk are my feelings that are filling me with drunken thoughts and I mourn the elegy of my ubi-sunt while I dance with your carpe diem, collige virgo rosae.
— Everything is a sign. My voice teacher in London died of cancer before she turned forty. Her death began my destiny. My husband composed an Opera for her, and I sang its premiere in Carnegie Hall. I was not very happy in London because I had no one to develop my voice. So I decided to cut my hair, and start a new life here.
— I decided to let mine grow because Samson lost his strength when they cut his hair. It’s dangerous to have your hair cut every time you have a new idea.
— But what about my husband. He’s bald.
— Does he have a beard?
— A red one.
— Then he’s protected. Something must always grow in you. When my hair was very short I didn’t shave my legs or armpits. What was growing was a secret.
— Everything is a sign. People appear in your life as guardian angels who guide you through different realms of reality.
— You believe in destiny?
— I certainly do.
— You think we all have a purpose?
— I certainly do.
— Why, then, may I ask you, do most people live their lives without even knowing what they have to do? I don’t know why I am here, but since I am here, I want to do something.
— It’s all symbolic, yes, it’s predetermined and, yes, it’s sealed with a fatal kiss. For your blessing and well-being. That is what I believe.
— A friend of mine, a mezzo, who I want you to meet, has a beautiful voice, and she told me, there are so many people nowadays with beautiful voices. She said, it’s not enough, she said, you need to be an actress and look the part.
— It’s a matter of contacts.
— Everything helps, I say, but it all boils down to talent. Not talent alone, discipline and determination.
— Yo no creo en el talento. Es un concepto burgués. No existe. Existen capacidades. Aptitudes. Cuánta gente pobre tiene capacidades que nunca ni siquiera puede darse cuenta de que las tiene. El talento es el engreimiento de una clase social como la tuya. Lo crea el ocio. Pero no la necesidad.
— Capacidad la tuya para negar. Mi padre tenía talento para escribir, pero ninguna capacidad para desarrollarlo. El talento es una gracia. La capacidad es la historia de las circunstancias.
— Here, Suzana, they are for you.
— Parrots, how lovely. Let me put them on.
— Aren’t they ravishing.
— Really, Mishi. You’re an artist.
— Don’t ever say that.
— Why not? You have talent. What you lack is confidence in yourself.
— It’s a matter of urge. The artist has an urgency. If you don’t act on it, you die. If you don’t create, nothing will create you.
— I don’t know. I don’t believe in life or death romantics. When I was studying at Cooper Union twenty-five years ago.
— Impossible!
— It’s true I’m an old dog.
— Impossible!
— Twenty-five years ago, I can’t believe it myself, I took a course with Andy Warhol and he said that he makes art because he doesn’t know what else to do. I gotta admit, I identified.
— Maybe, it’s true, I didn’t know what else to do, no, it’s not true, I do what I do because I had something to say.
— I make jewelry when my husband is cutting bricks and when the kids are napping, but I don’t long to create something that makes an impact, that lasts.
— You never know, look at Paloma.
— The difference is the intensity, and the materials aren’t everlasting.
— Gold is everlasting, diamonds, pearls.
— I’m talking about everlasting passions.
— I thought we were talking about producing art. Some people say my paintings are emotional. Others say they are cerebral. I would say they are intellectual. I could have been an architect. Space is what images are about, ordering borders, creating space so that you can breathe. Where is the wind blowing? Where does the light come from — thinking — planning before you act.
— Sometimes thinking kills the spontaneity. You yourself have often told me that you have an idea for a painting but you can’t tell me what it is about because if you tell me, you will feel as though you already did the painting. Ideas die without the execution. Mishi is talking about the drive to execute.
— Drive doesn’t only make artists. Napoleon — and all those politicians out there have urges to execute their commands.
— I have an urge to smoke. Who is to say whose urges are more important. Everybody has urges.
— What is the difference between an urge and a craving?
— You look for differences where there are no differences. But I will grant you — grant you a difference. An urge is an urge I must act on. If I crave something it doesn’t mean I feel the urgency. Although usually they’re a couple. I have the urge when I have the craving. Cravings and urges belong to hungry minds. Or hungry bodies, and they can create habits, or vices. And they can liberate human beings, give them joy, and produce music. If urges and cravings are not satisfied at the exact moment, they can become longings, and longings can last an eternity, or disappear rapidly, depending on the persistence and perseverance of the passion they can disappear, retract, and resurge, or repeat, and you can recognize the reappearance of the same longing that craves and the urge that like an inspiring comet is: now or never. And if you don’t get it now, forget about it, it’s now or never, now or never, impatience, because the urgency exists in the urge of the instant that dies — you know for certainty that that urge has a deadline, a limit, and if you don’t take advantage of the instant when you know it must be — like inspiration — it carries a vision and a passion and a moment — now or never — and it’s never again — again — in the same way — and you know it can repeat but never again the same — and these elements, contrary to popular opinion, carry the urges farther up in their immediacy, the attack must be done right away, no time to lose in talking about it, it is now or never, now or never.
— We are living in an era where genius does not exist. If we talk about talent, we think of the talented Michael Jackson, or Elvis Presley, or The Beatles. Ask a man in the streets who he thinks is talented. Michael Jackson, he’ll say, he’s talented.
— Nobody would say Michael Jackson. They’d say Pavarotti or Domingo.
— What talent does Michael Jackson have?
— Nobody mentioned Michael Jackson.
–¡Qué voz tiene!
— No tiene voz
— Tiene voz
–¿Qué voz tiene?
— Ninguna, but he’s great.
— What is grrrreat. I hear that word so much
— Want a hamburger?
— Yeah, great.
— Let’s go to a film.
— Great idea.
— He’s charismatic. Mesmerizing. Hypnotic.
— He’s great.
— I like him. I do. I really do.
— He’s a power house like Madonna.
— But he’s no Nijinsky. Not even Nureyev. Who is he? That’s the talent we recognize today. Forty years ago Picasso and Neruda were the Greta Garbos of painting and poetry.