I want to make a picture that could stand on its own, regardless of what it was a picture of. I've never been a bit interested in the fact that this was a picture of a blues musician or a street corner or something.
A picture is what it is and I've never noticed that it helps to talk about them, or answer specific questions about them, much less volunteer information in words. It wouldn't make any sense to explain them. Kind of diminishes them. People always want to know when something was taken, where it was taken, and, God knows, why it was taken. It gets really ridiculous. I mean, they're right there, whatever they are.
You become technically proficient whether you want to or not, the more you take pictures.
Photography is my only language.
I believe in a visual language that should be as strong as the written word.
It's much harder to work for yourself, by yourself, than to create work for a gallery, because there are no limits and you can do anything you want. It's always easier when you have a parameter, when you have a limit. You can work within the limit and push it and walk the line, but when you're given absolutely no limits, it's harder. You must really think. It's more challenging.
Success to me is being a good person, treating people well.
I think just about everything has been tackled, but it may be that things will be done again, only better and differently.
To talk about photos rather than making them seems idiotic to me. It's as though I went on and on about a woman I adored instead of making love to her.
I've always cared more about taking pictures than about the art market.
I think truth is a layered phenomenon. There are many truths that accumulate and build up. I am trying to peel back and explore these rich layers of truth. All truths are difficult to reach.
Some of my pictures are poem-like in the sense that they are very condensed, haiku-lik. There are others that, if they were poetry, would be more like Ezra Pound. There is a lot of information in most of my pictures, but not the kind of information you see in documentary photography. There is emotional information in my photographs.
There is a great quote from a female writer. She said, 'If you don't break out in a sweat of fear when you write, you are not writing well enough. I tend to agree. I think my best pictures come when I push myself.
All the good pictures that came so easily now make the next set of pictures virtually impossible in your mind.
[The small camera] taught me energy and decisiveness and immediacy ... The large camera taught me reverence, patience, and meditation.
A lot of what I am looking for is a moment of astonishment, he says. Those moments of pure consciousness when you involuntarily inhale and say 'Wow!'
I have to say, taking photographs is such an instantaneous act. The recognition and the acting on the recognition, depending on your equipment, is close to instantaneous.
'Tough' meant it was an uncompromising image, something that came from your gut, out of instinct, raw, of the moment, something that couldn't be described in any other way. So it was tough. Tough to like, tough to see, tough to make, tough to understand. The tougher they were the more beautiful they became.
What is the art experience about? Really, I'm not interested in making Art at all. I never, ever, think about it. To say the word Art, it's almost like a curse on art. I do know that I want to try to get closer to myself. The older I get, the more indications I have about what it is to get closer to yourself. You try less hard. I just want to be.
Some people have told me they remember the film that one of my images is derived from, but in fact I had no film in mind at all.
My ideas are not developed before I actually do the pieces.
One reason I was interested in photography was to get away from the preciousness of the art object.
I do what feels natural, but I can't say I haven't thought about it.
I was photographing every meal I ate, every person I met, every waiter or waitress who served me, every bed I slept in, every toilet I used.
I don't have to have a single point of emphasis in the picture. It can be complex, because it's so detailed that the viewer can take time and read it, and look at something here, and look at something there, and they can pay attention to a lot more.
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