Quotes About Photography

The one thing that is always clear in my mind is that the people, and their stories, and the themes of life that I photograph are always more important to me than the process of photography itself.

[Documentary photography] is unwittingly literary, because it is nothing other than an observation of contemporary life apprehended at the right moment by an artist capable of seizing it. (1928)

Without my photography life would be boring. Photography adds an extra dimension to my life. Somehow it confirms my place in the world

I wanted life to be episodic. I wanted to be a magazine photographer and I was willing to do what it took to become that.

Behind the camera, I was invisible. When I lifted it up to my eye it was like I crawled into the lens, losing myself there. and everything else fell away.

I wouldn't wear tiny amounts of clothing in my real life so I don't think it's necessary to wear that stuff in photo-shoots.

When I first came to America there still was Look Magazine and LIFE Magazine, and the photography in those magazines was amazing to look at. They had the best portraits, and their news photography.

A photograph is just a little, teeny-weeny, small piece of life. I feel like I see so much more than what I can actually get.

Only photography has been able to divide human life into a series of moments, each of them has the value of a complete existence.

Still photographs are the most powerful weapon in the world. People believe them, but photographs do lie, even without manipulation. They are only half-truths.

I have no fear of photography as long as it cannot be used in heaven and in hell.

The camera will never compete with the brush and palette until such time as photography can be taken to Heaven or Hell.

Whenever I see a photograph of some sportsman grinning over his kill, I am always impressed by the striking moral and esthetic superiority of the dead animal to the live one.

So many pictures, so little time!

Photography is a tough life: you can be taken, framed, exposed, shot, captured, and hung all in the same day.

The goal is not to change your subjects, but for the subject to change the photographer.

Tourists are terrorists with cameras. Terrorists are tourists with guns.

Photography is more than a medium for factual communication of ideas. It is a creative art.

Twelve significant photographs in any one year is a good crop

In my mind's eye, I visualize how a particular . . . sight and feeling will appear on a print. If it excites me, there is a good chance it will make a good photograph. It is an intuitive sense, an ability that comes from a lot of practice.

Sometimes I do get to places just when God's ready to have somebody click the shutter.

score, and the print the performance

Some photographers take reality...and impose the domination of their own thought and spirit. Others come before reality more tenderly and a photograph to them is an instrument of love and revelation.

I have often thought that if photography were difficult in the true sense of the term -- meaning that the creation of a simple photograph would entail as much time and effort as the production of a good watercolor or etching -- there would be a vast improvement in total output. The sheer ease with which we can produce a superficial image often leads to creative disaster.