I am only interested in painting the actual person; in doing a painting of them, not in using them to some ulterior end of art. For me, to use someone doing something not native to them would be wrong. Lucian Freud : Paintings (1987)
When I look at a body I know it gives me choices of what to put in a painting; what will suit me and what won't. There is a distinction between fact and truth. Truth has an element of revelation about it. If something is true, it does more than strike one as merely being so. Lucian Freud : Paintings (1987)
Words cited by Hughes as written by Freud on a wall in his studio, p. 22 Lucian Freud : Paintings (1987)
I always felt that my work hadn't much to do with art; my admirations for other art had very little room to show themselves in my work because I hoped that if I concentrated enough the intensity of scrutiny alone would force life into the pictures. I ignored the fact that art, after all, derives from art. Now I realize that this is the case. Lucian Freud : Paintings (1987)