Berenice Abbott

Let us first say what photography is not. A photograph is not a painting, a poem, a symphony, a dance. read more

Let us first say what photography is not. A photograph is not a painting, a poem, a symphony, a dance. It is not just a pretty picture, not an exercise in contortionist techniques and sheer print quality. It is or should be a significant document, a penetrating statement, which can be described in a very simple term - selectivity.

I took to photography like a duck to water. I never wanted to do anything else. Excitement about the subject read more

I took to photography like a duck to water. I never wanted to do anything else. Excitement about the subject is the voltage which pushes me over the mountain of drudgery necessary to produce the final photograph.

There are many teachers who could ruin you. Before you know it you could be a pale copy of this read more

There are many teachers who could ruin you. Before you know it you could be a pale copy of this teacher or that teacher. You have to evolve on your own.

Photography can only represent the present. Once photographed, the subject becomes part of the past.

Photography can only represent the present. Once photographed, the subject becomes part of the past.

What I mean by objectivity is not the objectivity of a machine, but of a sensible human being with the read more

What I mean by objectivity is not the objectivity of a machine, but of a sensible human being with the mystery of personal selection at the heart of it. The second challenge has been to impose order onto the things seen and to supply the visual context and the intellectual framework - that to me is the art of photography.