I didn't see an abstract painting until I was 18, when I went to Vincent Price's house and saw Richard Niebencorn, Wolff, Jackson Pollack. He had an amazing collection. I didn't know people painted abstractly, I thought I was just doing something wholeheartedly.

Dennis Hopper

Categorized in : People House Saws

The man is clear in his mind, but his soul is mad.

Dennis Hopper

mad movie men

It takes more than going down to the video store and renting "Easy Rider" to be a rebel.

Dennis Hopper

easy-rider rebel video

I was very shy, and it was a lot easier for me to communicate if I had a camera between me and other people.

Dennis Hopper

cameras shy people

Like all artists, I want to cheat death a little and contribute something to the next generation.

Dennis Hopper

generations artist want

Just because it happened to you, doesn't mean it's interesting.

Dennis Hopper

music-business mean interesting

People keep asking me, 'What evil lurks in you to play such bad characters?' There is no evil in me, I just wear tight underwear.

Dennis Hopper

play character people

I've been sober now for 18 years. With all the drugs, psychedelics and narcotics I did, I was [really] an alcoholic. Honestly, I only used to do cocaine so I could sober up and drink more. My last five years of drinking was a nightmare. I was drinking a half-gallon of rum with a fifth of rum on the side, in case I ran out, 28 beers a day, and three grams of cocaine just to keep me moving around. And I thought I was doing fine because I wasn't crawling around drunk on the floor.

Dennis Hopper

drinking beer moving

The reality of things going on around me is more interesting than the fantasies of the world I work in.

Dennis Hopper

reality world interesting

Every time I go to Europe, I remember that James Dean never saw Europe, but yet I see his face everywhere. There's James Dean, Humphrey Bogart and Marilyn Monroe - windows of the Champs Elysees, discos in the south of Spain, restaurants in Sweden, t-shirts in Moscow. My life was confused and disoriented for years by his passing. My sense of destiny destroyed - the great films he would have directed, the great performances he would have given, the great humanitarian he would have become, and yet, he's the greatest actor and star I have ever known.

Dennis Hopper

confused destiny stars

There are moments that I`ve had some real brilliance, you know. But I think they are moments. And sometimes, in a career, moments are enough.

Dennis Hopper

careers real thinking

I am just a middle-class farm boy from Dodge City and my grandparents were wheat farmers. I thought painting, acting, directing and photography were all part of being an artist. I have made my money that way. And I have had some fun. It's not been a bad life.

Dennis Hopper

photography artist fun

In a world where the dead

Dennis Hopper

loses trouble world

You want to hear about insanity? I was found running naked through the jungles in Mexico. At the Mexico City airport, I decided I was in the middle of a movie and walked out on the wing on takeoff. My body... my liver... okay, my brain... went.

Dennis Hopper

airports cities running

Art is a bad word in Hollywood. You use art too many times and they show you the elevator and then your name is taken off the parking lot.

Dennis Hopper

taken names art

When we're out of the eighties, the nineties are gonna make the sixties look like the fifties!

Dennis Hopper

sixty eighty looks

My whole written history is one big lie! I mean, I can't even believe my history.

Dennis Hopper

mean believe lying

I think not being a professional photographer was actually a blessing, because it allowed me to shoot things professional photographers wouldn't shoot, or wouldn't try or attempt to shoot without lights. So I did all my stuff natural and without lights.

Dennis Hopper

light blessing thinking

I think of [my photographs] as found paintings because I don't crop them, I don't manipulate them or anything. So they're like found objects to me.

Dennis Hopper

found-objects painting thinking

For most of my life, I wasn't on the Left.

Dennis Hopper

left

Easy Rider' was never a motorcycle movie to me. A lot of it was about politically what was going on in the country.

Dennis Hopper

easy-rider motorcycle country