Jerry Uelsmann Quotes

• My creative process begins when I get out with the camera and interact with the world. A camera is truly a license to explore. There are no uninteresting things. There are just uninterested people.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Photography, People, Creative

  "Master Interview; Jerry Uelsmann". Interview with Chris Maher and Larry Berman, www.shutterbug.com. September 1, 2007.

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• Photography is just light remembering itself.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Photography, Light, Photographer

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• The camera basically is a license to explore.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Cameras, License

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• I think of my photographs as being obviously symbolic, but not symbolically obvious.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Thinking, Photograph, Obvious

  Jerry Uelsmann, James Enyeart (1980). “Jerry N. Uelsmann: Photographs from 1975-1979”

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• It's equally hard and labor intensive to create an image on the computer as it is in a darkroom. Believe me.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Photography, Believe, Computer

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• I have gradually confused photography with life.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Photography, Confused, Photographer

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• The goal of the artist is not to resolve life's mysteries, but to deepen them.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Artist, Goal, Photographer

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• Of course, in order to make art, the frustration of not working has to be greater than the frustration of working.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Art, Frustration, Order

  "Master Interview; Jerry Uelsmann". Interview with Chris Maher and Larry Berman, www.shutterbug.com. September 1, 2007.

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• Well, I do think, particularly the way I work, the better images occur when you're moving to the fringes of your own understanding. That's where self-doubt and risk taking are likely to occur. It's when you trust what's happening at a non-intellectual non-conscious level that you can produce work that later resonates, often in a way that you can't articulate a response to.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Photography, Moving, Thinking

  "Master Interview; Jerry Uelsmann". Interview with Chris Maher and Larry Berman, www.shutterbug.com. September 1, 2007.

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• My visual quest is driven by a desire to create a universe capable of supporting feelings and ideas.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Ideas, Feelings, Desire

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• The simple act of having a camera, not a cell phone, but a camera-camera, there’s a kind of a heightened perceptional awareness that occurs. Like, I could walk from here to the highway in two minutes, but if I had a camera, that walk could take me two hours.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Simple, Phones, Cells

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• It is the illusion of knowledge, not ignorance, that keeps one from growing.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Ignorance, Growing, Photographer

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• One of the major changes in attitude that occurred in the world of art as we moved from the nineteenth into the twentieth century was that the twentieth century artist became more involved with personal expression than with celebrating exclusively the values of the society or the church. Along with this change came a broader acceptance of the belief that the artist can invent a reality that is more meaningful than the one that is literally given to the eye. I subscribe enthusiastically to this.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Meaningful, Art, Attitude

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• Ultimately, my hope is to amaze myself.

  Jerry Uelsmann

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• In the arts there are many right answers.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Art, Answers, Photographer

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• When the entire process becomes a prescribed ritual that does not allow for spontaneous variations and reactions, the vitality of the medium and our relation to it suffers.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Suffering, Vitality, Doe

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• The camera is a fluid way of encountering that other reality

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Reality, Cameras, Way

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• I think of many of my photographs as being obviously symbolic but not symbolically obvious. There isn't any specific correlation between the symbols in this image and any content that I have in mind.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Thinking, Mind, Photographer

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• And young people who are learning digital skills discover that the real challenge is coming up with an image that resonates, first of all, with your self and hopefully, with an audience. They can learn all these new techniques and think that they're easier to use, but creating great images isn't about the tools.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Photography, Real, Thinking

  "Master Interview; Jerry Uelsmann". Interview with Chris Maher and Larry Berman, www.shutterbug.com. September 1, 2007..

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• Let us not be afraid to allow for post-visualization. By post-visualization I refer to the willingness on the part of the photographer to revisualize the final image at any point in the entire photographic process.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Finals, Photographer, Process

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• I'm really very concerned with helping to create an attitude of freedom and daring toward the craft of photography.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Photography, Attitude, Crafts

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• The truth is that one is more frequently blessed with ideas while working.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Blessed, Ideas, Photographer

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• The contemporary artist...is not bound to a fully conceived, previsioned end. His mind is kept alert to in-process discovery and a working rapport is established between the artist and his creation. While it may be true, as Nathan Lyons stated, 'The eye and the camera see more than the mind knows,' is it not also conceivable that the mind knows more than the eye and the camera can see?

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Photography, Eye, Artist

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• The anticipation of discovering new possibilities becomes my greatest joy.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Joy, Anticipation, Possibility

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• I've learned over the years that when you get a clue to another possibility to follow it through.

  Jerry Uelsmann

  Years, Photographer, Clue

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