Peter Blake

"I don’t think artists should be sponsored. You should not rely on grants. You either make a success of your art or you don’t. I worked as an artist for a number of years without making much money – I …"

"My dealer was a friend of the Beatles and the Stones, and he suggested they used a fine artist. I talked to the Beatles at length about what the cover would be. I worked out it would show the moment a…"

"I say to people I'm in my late period. Obviously, as you get older you're in your late period anyway, but to decide you are becomes a concept. It's related to the concept of my retirement, which was a…"

"People think Sgt Pepper is part of my name."

"Brian Sewell is a fool. For some years he seemed to have it in for me and Hockney and Kitaj. Even if he wasn't writing about us he'd always find a way of bringing us in. He'd say, "so and so was a bad…"

"Most artists go potty as they get older: dafter and madder as they get more celibate. So I am consciously going to do that."

"Sgt Pepper made me more famous but it did not change me as an artist."

"He opened the door that so many of us went through, the door of possibility, by saying anything an artist makes is art."