Everyone was saying that painting was dead, and really believing it. It was a very difficult time for me. I felt unsupported and isolated… - Celia Paul

When I first met Lucian he wasn’t that famous. He was notorious, but he did not have a big international reputation or anything. He was a genuinely Dostoevskian character it seemed to me, living much more on the edge. And then later he became more a national treasure and was quite seduced by that.

When I first started doing self-portraits – and I didn’t start until I was in my 40s, quite late – I did these portraits where my hand was kind of stretched out toward the canvas, as if about to paint…I suppose I was imitating those famous poses of Goya or Rembrandt. But something felt so false about that. Somehow women don’t have a secure place in the history of art and to portray myself in this way standing squarely, about to paint, it wasn’t right.

From the earliest memory every day started with prayer and ended with prayer…And it is still in my bloodstream, even though I am not conventionally religious. I am not good at belonging to groups. But doesn’t everyone think about God?