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Irving Penn

Irving Penn Quotes

Photographer

Irving Penn, an American photographer renowned for his exquisite fashion and portrait photography. His work spans multiple genres, including fashion, portrait, still life, and documentary photography. Penn's influence on the photography world is profound, and his work is still widely studied and appreciated today.

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Famous Irving Penn Quotes

“I feed on art more than I ever do on photographs. I can admire photography, but I wouldn't go to it out of hunger.”

Art I Can Photography Photograph Hunger Admire

Author:Irving Penn

“Using simple equipment and daylight alone is for me a pleasure and a replenishment.”

Simple Pleasure Equipment Daylight

Author:Irving Penn

“What I really try to do is photograph people at rest, in a state of serenity.”

People Trying States Photograph Serenity

Author:Irving Penn

“I share with many people the feeling that there is a sweetness and constancy to light that falls into a studio from the north sky that sets it beyond any other illumination. It is a light of such penetrating clarity that even a simple object lying by chance in such a light takes on an inner glow, almost a voluptuousness.”

People Feelings Light Lying Fall Chance Simple Sky Share Objects Studios Clarity Sweetness Illumination Constancy

Author:Irving Penn

“Sometime in 1964 I realized that I was a victim of a printmaking obsession, a condition that persists today.”

Today Conditions Victim I Realized Obsession Persist Printmaking

Author:Irving Penn

“The printed page seems to have come to something of a dead end for all of us.”

Ends Seems Pages Printed Dead Ends

Book:Irving Penn master images: the collections of the National Museum of American Art and the National Portrait Gallery

Source: Irving Penn master images: the collections of the National Museum of American Art and the National Portrait Gallery

“A good photograph is one that communicates a fact, touches the heart and leaves the viewer a changed person for having seen it. It is, in a word, effective.”

Inspirational Heart Persons Facts Changed Photography Photographer Photograph Communicate Viewers Photography By Photographers Inspirational Photography Inspiring Photography Digital Photography Film Photography Photography And Film Good Photography Changed Person

Author:Irving Penn

“Sensitive people faced with the prospect of a camera portrait put on a face they think is one they would like to show the world very often what lies behind the facade is rare and more wonderful than the subject knows or dares to believe.”

People Thinking Knows World Believe Shows Faces Lying Behinds Wonderful Subjects Cameras Dare Sensitive Portraits Facade

Author:Irving Penn

“A beautiful print is a thing in itself, not just a halfway house on the way to the page.”

Way Beautiful House Photography Pages Print Halfway

Book:Irving Penn master images: the collections of the National Museum of American Art and the National Portrait Gallery

Source: Irving Penn master images: the collections of the National Museum of American Art and the National Portrait Gallery

“Most of the time the ones who dislike the pictures the most confirm to me that the picture has hit home and is probably truer than I know. Nobody minds a boring picture, they mind a picture that has gotten to the soft core.”

Knows Mind Home Boring Core Dislike

Author:Irving Penn

“I myself have always stood in the awe of the camera. I recognize it for the instrument it is, part Stradivarius, part scalpel.”

Cameras Instruments Awe Scalpels

Author:Irving Penn

“I am a professional photographer because it is the best way I know to earn the money I require to take care of my wife and children.”

Knows Way Children Care Wife Photographer Take Care My Wife Best Way Professional Photographer

Author:Irving Penn

“Over the years I must have spent thousands of hours silently brushing on the liquid coatings, preparing each sheet in anticipation of reaching the perfect print.”

Years Hours Perfect Reaching Print Anticipation Preparing Sheets Liquid Brushing

Book:Irving Penn: Small Trades

Source: Irving Penn: Small Trades

“Many photographers feel their client is the subject. My client is a woman in Kansas who reads Vogue. I'm trying to intrigue, stimulate, feed her. My responsibility is to the reader. The severe portrait that is not the greatest joy in the world to the subject may be enormously interesting to the reader.”

World Feels Trying May Joy Interesting Responsibility Subjects Reader Photographer Clients Portraits Severe Intrigue Kansas Vogue

Author:Irving Penn

“I can get obsessed by anything if i look at it long enough. That's the curse of being a photographer.”

Ifs Looks Long Art I Can Enough Seeing Photography Photographer Curse Obsessed

Author:Irving Penn

“I've tried a few times to depart from what I know I can do, and I've failed. I've tried to work outside the studio, but it introduces too many variables that I can't control. I'm really quite narrow, you know.”

Knows I Can Can Do Work Out Studios Introducing Variables

Author:Irving Penn

“Photographing a cake can be art.”

Art Photography Cake

Author:Irving Penn

“I always thought we were selling dreams, not clothes”

Dream Clothes Selling

Author:Irving Penn

“In portrait photography there is something more profound that we seek inside a person, while being painfully aware that a limitation of our medium is that the inside is recordable only insofar as it is apparent on the outside...Very often what lies behind the facade is rare and more wonderful than the subject knows or dares to believe.”

Knows Believe Persons Lying Behinds Wonderful Subjects Photography Profound Dare Mediums Limitation Portraits Facade Portrait Photography

Author:Irving Penn

“Working on photography is working on oneself.”

Photography Oneself

Author:Irving Penn

“Liberman said to me, 'I must cut back on the work you do for Vogue. The editors don't like it. They say the photographs burn on the page . After some years, I began to understand that what they wanted of me was simply a nice, sweet, clean-looking image of a lovely young woman.”

Love Years Said Age Wanted Young Nice Cutting Sweet Pages Clean Photograph Lovely Editors Young Women Vogue Nice Sweet

Author:Irving Penn

About the Author

Born: June 16, 1917
Died: October 7, 2009
Known for: Photographer
Quotes: 21

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Books & Sources

Irving Penn master images: the collections of the National Museum of American Art and the National Portrait GalleryRelated source material

Irving Penn: Small TradesRelated source material

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