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How do you view the paintings you have made of women?
Well, I did notice again, just recently, looking at all the combined paintings of women in the New York exhibition, that I was surprised at how contradictory the images were. There are the images of idealized women, starting with the ema nude [CR: 134], where she really seems to be descending the stairs like an angel coming down from heaven. Then there's the painting of the daughter [CR: 663-5], which is also an idealization since its essence is a longing for culture, for the beauty in art which we no longer have, which is why she turns away. Then we have the Lesende [Reading Woman] [CR: 804], which is also an idealized image because she is so taken by Vermeer, the artist-god, that she tries to represent a similar beauty. Who knows, maybe those are desired ideals. And then there's the other side, the victims. The black-and-white paintings of women have more to do with their everyday lives, which only attract attention when something untoward happens to them – when they become victims, like the eight student nurses [CR: 130], and others. The Isa paintings [CR: 790-4,790-5] were based on photographs I took. And I never painted my mother as such; there's only a family portrait [CR: 30] in which she appears.

Today we know that many of your portraits are of members of your family, and we know their history. Take the painting of your aunt Marianne [CR: 87], for instance, who was killed in February 1945, or your uncle Rudi [CR: 85], wearing a Wehrmacht uniform. Why were the biographical references in your paintings ignored for so long?
I had no desire for people to discuss these matters. I wanted them to see the paintings, not the painter and his relatives, otherwise they would have somehow given me a label, reached a premature conclusion. In truth, factual information – names or dates – have never interested me much. Those things are like an alien language that can interfere with the language of the painting, or even prevent its emergence. You can compare it to dreams: you have a very specific and individual pictorial language that you either accept or that you can translate rashly and wrongly. Of course, you can ignore dreams, but that would be a shame, because they're useful.

Your canvases always display perfect technique…
Unlike the period when one had to learn technique and train from the youngest age, today no one masters technique any more at all. Painting has become so easy – anyone can do it! – that it's often very bad. In this context, as soon as someone knows technique, it jumps out at the viewer. That said, for me technique is something obvious: it's never a problem. I've just remained extremely attached to a culture of painting. What's much more important to me is the attempt, the desire to show what I want, in the best way possible. That's why technique is useful for me. For me, perfection is as important as the image itself.