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Quotes by Photographer
"Does not the very word 'creative' mean to build, to initiate, to give out, to act - rather than to be acted upon, to be subjective? Living photography is positive in its approach, it sings a song of life - not death."
35
"I tried to keep both arts alive, but the camera won. I found that while the camera does not express the soul, perhaps a photograph can!"
Soul,
35
"What I am interested in now is the landscape. Pictures without people. I wouldn't be surprised if eventually there are no people in my pictures. It is so emotional."
35
"The marvels of daily life are exciting; no movie director can arrange the unexpected that you find in the street."
Life,
35
"Often while traveling with a camera we arrive just as the sun slips over the horizon of a moment, too late to expose film, only time enough to expose our hearts."
35
"And I remember that the editors wanted to have a witness to say that this was really the case, because it was a very sharp picture of the just the face, the head of the fetus inside the womb."
35
"I feel a responsibility to my backyard. I want it to be taken care of and protected."
35
"When you grow up your mother says, 'Wear rubbers or you'll catch cold.' When you become an adult you discover that you have the right not to wear rubbers and to see if you catch cold or not. It's something like that."
35
"We both came from families in which parents got married, had children and the whole thing. So we were not the kind of people to live together permanently."
35
"Photography to the amateur is recreation, to the professional it is work, and hard work too, no matter how pleasurable it my be."
35
"They often ask me to shoot for them. But I say no. I think an old guy like me ought not take pages away from young photographers who need the exposure."
Old,
35
"The world is shrinking as we see more and more of it in the media, and the more we see of the world, the smaller we are, the more aware we are of how insignificant any one of us is."
35
"The photographer begins to feel big and bloated and so big he can't walk through one of these doors because he gets a good byline; he gets notices all over the world and so forth; but they're really - the important people are the people he photographs."
34
"My own eyes are no more than scouts on a preliminary search, for the camera's eye may entirely change my idea."
34
"I didn't want to travel. I didn't want to leave my family. I heard all these stories from Dad about not having Edward around when he was young, and I didn't want that to happen."
34
"I became kind of a drop-out in science after I came back to America. I wanted to photograph."
34
"I don't think there's any such thing as teaching people photography, other than influencing them a little. People have to be their own learners. They have to have a certain talent."
34
"Once you develop your own style, you know when you're able to give your best. Feeling at home is part of it, and I don't think that's an L.A. thing. It's a matter of the environment and of what affects you."
34
"Americans have an abiding belief in their ability to control reality by purely material means... airline insurance replaces the fear of death with the comforting prospect of cash."
34
"The trouble with photographing beautiful women is that you never get into the dark room until after they've gone."
34
"The creative act lasts but a brief moment, a lightning instant of give-and-take, just long enough for you to level the camera and to trap the fleeting prey in your little box."
Act,
34
"When Paul was arrested in Japan for having hash in his luggage, I thought he'd be out that night. But it became really serious stuff when he was kept in a cell. I became more fearful as the days went by."
34
"Television probably has become the most evocative, widely observed signpost we have."
34
"A very receptive state of mind... not unlike a sheet of film itself - seemingly inert, yet so sensitive that a fraction of a second's exposure conceives a life in it."
34
"The education, the cultural awareness, is different in Europe, especially in France, from that in the United States. So I think the public will be much more appreciative of many images."
34
"What I mean by photographing as a participant rather than observer is that I'm not only involved directly with some of the activities that I photograph, such as mountain climbing, but even when I'm not I have the philosophy that my mind and body are part of the natural world."
34
"I don't like to work with assistants. I'm already one too many; the camera alone would be enough."
Work,
34
"I had been working in colour for ten years or so and looked at digital and liked the possibilities it gave me."
34
"We sometimes freeze the specimen with liquid nitrogen, which is extremely cold, you know. This is another technique we use now - but the specimens are not alive."
Now,
34
"We spend so much time together, because that's how we like it. I never used to go on girl's nights out, even at school. And Paul has never liked going out for a night with the boys, either."
34
"I always thought of photography as a naughty thing to do - that was one of my favorite things about it, and when I first did it, I felt very perverse."
34
"Now to consult the rules of composition before making a picture is a little like consulting the law of gravitation before going for a walk. Such rules and laws are deduced from the accomplished fact; they are the products of reflection."
34
"But I was very disappointed that I didn't get a chance to go overseas with that group, might not have gotten back but I wanted very much to go because there's not much of a record of the exploits of the first Negro fighter group."
34
"A virulent, aggressive minority has decided that Americans don't know themselves what it is they should see, and need to be protected by people who are wiser than they are, even if they are only a tiny sliver of the population."
34
"I bought my first camera in Seattle, Washington. Only paid about seven dollars and fifty cents for it."
33
"It is the gift of seeing the life around them clearly and vividly, as something that is exciting in its own right. It is an innate gift, varying in intensity with the individual's temperament and environment."
33
"I used to hate doing color. I hated transparency film. The way I did color was by not wanting to know what kind of film was in my camera."
33
"Sometimes I enjoy just photographing the surface because I think it can be as revealing as going to the heart of the matter."
33
"An artist is nothing without his or her obsessions, and I have mine."
33
"Millions of men have lived to fight, build palaces and boundaries, shape destinies and societies; but the compelling force of all times has been the force of originality and creation profoundly affecting the roots of human spirit."
33
"One of the biggest mistakes a photographer can make is to look at the real world and cling to the vain hope that next time his film will somehow bear a closer resemblance to it."
33
"I had daydreams and fantasies when I was growing up. I always wanted to live in a log cabin at the foot of a mountain. I would ride my horse to town and pick up provisions. Then return to the cabin, with a big open fire, a record player and peace."
33
"Oh, you ask me, what is the greatest torture of a person who does portraits for a living? I could fill several volumes with nice nasty stories. I don't know."
33
"As an artist you have to have a certain amount of arrogance."
33
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