Quotes from Rolf Harris

People say 'Are you going to retire?' To me, that sort of equates with lying down and dying. When you're doing something you love to do, why would you stop?

I remember very vividly what it's like to be a child. The adults you liked were the ones who listened to you when you spoke and gave you time to say what you wanted to say and actually listened, and quite often reacted as a result of what you'd said.

As I walked up the imposing steps of the Royal Academy, I came fact to face with Alwen Hughes. She looked just as stunning as she had done in my first year at art school.

Bob Marley - yeah, I've always loved his stuff.

I hope that maybe I am on this planet to try and spread a bit of love and affection and to try and help people to warm toward their fellow man instead of all this destruction and misery.

People can see you on TV sloshing paint around with big four-inch brushes, and I learned to talk to camera in a friendly voice, not talking down to people, just explaining what I was doing. People like Picasso, Van Gogh, and Rembrandt did not have a weekly TV programme where people could see them painting.

I always felt I had to fill silences, usually by singing or whistling. It was nerves and shyness, really.

I draw the line at filth and crude language. It seems to be an excuse for not being funny.

I will never shave off my beard and moustache. I did once, for charity, but my wife said, 'Good grief, how awful, you look like an American car with all the chrome removed.'

When I was presenting 'Animal Hospital,' the grey started to creep into my beard and moustache. I used my wife's mascara to darken it.

I've always tried to retain that childlike wonder.

George Martin recorded a lot of my stuff before the Beatles, so I observed their meteoric rise.

It's essential that you make eye contact with your audience. You've got to know what's happening out there.

I regard myself as being enormously lucky to have been accepted by the British public in so many areas.

The Avalanches was a great dance track, I thought, but I always feel a little bit let down when there are just two lines repeated constantly. Over and over. Forever.

I love the word 'fantastic'. It represents how I always feel.

If I could go back in time, I'd return to when my parents were alive and appreciate them more than I did when I was growing up.

I had always been told by my parents, not implicitly told, but every inference was that Britain was the hub of the universe.

My approach to painting doesn't involve any heavy thinking about how am I going to present this, what am I going to do.

When I draw my caricature self-portrait, I always do a huge smile.

If you turn a smiling face on the world, you've got a chance of finishing up a good-looking old person.

Prison is no hardship, really. I'm in the art room as an assistant to the tutor, and basically, I'm doing what I like.

It's important to seize the moment. If there's something you want to say, don't put it off, because you might miss your chance.

Try and spread a lot of love and affection around the world. The most important thing is not to 'con' the public. Be real.