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Q: When you paint, Miss O'Keffe, you're trying to say something and you talk about messages in your book. Are these messages to yourself or to the outside world?

A: Well, I probably say it to myself without really thinking too seriously about it. The reason I repeat it is that I repeat the painting is that I always think the next time I'm going to get it right. But, I've been at it a long time and I haven't the door right yet.

Q: I've been studying a series of paintings in you book, "Jack in the Pulpit." You take the first the flower from a distance, a single flower, and then you come closer and closer and eventually you come right inside the flower. And yet, it seems to grow bigger instead of smaller. What were you reaching for?

A: To find out what is the most important part of the flower. What is the most important about it. If the flower didn't have that piece in the center of it, it wouldn't be much.

Q: It's almost as if you wanted to touch it and feel it?

A: Of course, you want to touch it. What are your hands for?

Q: I notice in your book that you talk about your childhood in Madison, Wisconsin. What was your father's occupation?

A: He was a farmer.

Q: How many children were there?

A: Seven, and I was the second. I was not a favorite. My older brother was a favorite and my sister next to me was a favorite.

Q: Any of the other children want to be artists?

A: One of them painted. But, she never had...it takes courage..kind of nerve to keep on.

Q: As you look back do you think of yourself as a kind of a maverick in the family?

A: What do you mean by maverick?

Q: Completely different, not in the ordinary swim.

A: We were all very different....It wasn't a close family.

Q: You write about one of your summer's there and walking across a green portion of grass, and then a road. A dusty road. You said that you felt that you wanted to get down into it.