Quotes from Minor White

Reaching a 'creative' state of mind thru positive action is considered preferable to waiting for 'inspiration'.

Photographers who come up with power never get accused of imitating anyone else even though they photograph the same broom, same street, same portraits.

I'm always mentally photographing everything as practice.

Be still with yourself until the object of your attention affirms your presence.

We could teach photography as a way to make a living, and best of all, somehow to get students to experience for themselves photography as a way of life.

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.

Camera and eye are together a time machine with which the mind and human being can do the same kind of violence to time and space as dreams.

In putting images together I become active, and excitement is of another order - synthesis overshadows analysis.

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.

The development of a love of medium and a responsibility for one's own pictures is an overall goal.

If all your life means to you is water running over rocks, then photograph it, but I want to create something that would not have existed without me.

It is curious that I always want to group things, a series of sonnets, a series of photographs; whatever rationalizations appear, they originate in urges that are rarely satisfied with single images.

When you approach something to photograph it, first be still with yourself until the object of your attention affirms your presence. Then don't leave until you have captured its essence.

No matter how slow the film, Spirit always stands still long enough for the photographer It has chosen.

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.

When you approach something to photograph it, first be still with yourself until the object of your attention affirms your presence. Then don't leave until you have captured its essence.

No matter how slow the film, Spirit always stands still long enough for the photographer it has chosen.

One should not only photograph things for what they are but for what else they are.