Photography is a form of time travel.
Mallarme said that everything in the world exists in order to end in a book. Today everything exists to end in a photograph.
Outstanding past work in photography, and in fact in all the arts, is very important to today's photographers. But it should be used for inspiration and not for imitation. These works should be something to be built upon, not to be repeated.
Photography is not easy. You know it takes a painter or a sculpture or a musician years to perfect their technique. Then they're free to make an expression in a matter of moments. It takes moments for a photographer to perfect his technique. And then it takes years for him to make it into something that is truly creative and worthwhile.
I wanted to be a car mechanic and I wanted to race cars and the idea of trying to make something out of my life wasn't really a priority. But the accident allowed me to apply myself at school. I got great grades. Eventually I got very excited about anthropology and about social sciences and psychology, and I was able to push my photography even further and eventually discovered film and film schools.
I am neither an economist nor a photographer of monuments, and I am not much of a journalist either. What I am trying to do more than anything else is to observe life.
One of my oldest friends from Kansas, his sister was married to Ben [Folds] and wrote lyrics on his first couple of albums. I got to meet him the first time I saw them in concert at The Bottleneck, a great bar in Lawrence, Kansas. Then, he was the musical guest my first or second week as a writer on SNL. I was like, "I don't know if you remember me?" And he was like, "Oh my god, yeah!" He's a big photography fan, as am I.
I don't care so much anymore about 'good photography'; I am gathering evidence for history.
When you see what you express through photography, you realize all the things that can no longer be the objectives of painting. Why should an artist persist in treating subjects that can be established so clearly with the lens of a camera?
It's just seeing - at least the photography I care about. You either see or you don't see. The rest is academic. Anyone can learn how to develop. It's how you organize what you see into a picture.
The photographer must bear the responsibility for his work and its effect …[for] photographic journalism, because of its tremendous audience reached by publications using it, has more influence on public thinking than any other branch of photography.
If you view your life as a piece of fabric or a tapestry, the photography is the stitching. It keeps everything together.
Be yourself. I much prefer seeing something, even it is clumsy, that doesn't look like somebody else's work.
I usually befriend the camera department very early on in the film and drive them nuts. I'm constantly bombarding them with questions and going through the stills photography. A film set is a great place for me and I love it.
As Spectator I wanted to explore photography not as a question (a theme) but as a wound.
What's the point of getting killed if you've got the wrong exposure?
I found that photography was a great way of relaxing on the set.
I see my finished platinum print (in the viewfinder) in all its desired qualities, before my exposure.
I've been a photographer all these years. . . I haven't been in my own darkroom for 10 years.
He made me suddenly realize that photographs could reach eternity through the moment.