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Ralph Eugene Meatyard Quotes

Photographer

Ralph Eugene Meatyard was an American photographer known for his surrealistic style of photography. His works often explore themes of human existence and profound insights into the relationship between nature and humanity.

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All Thinking Photograph Form Has Beens Ifs People Photographer Able Abstract Areas

Famous Ralph Eugene Meatyard Quotes

“Am I looking at a mask or am I the mask being looked at?”

Mask

Author:Ralph Eugene Meatyard

“... if [a photograph is] unbelievably real it becomes superreal or another kind of super real, better than real... [it] also can be, I think, so heartfelt that you almost can get a pang of compassion for the thing.”

Ifs Thinking Kind Real Compassion Photograph Heartfelt

Author:Ralph Eugene Meatyard

“I have always tried to keep truth in my photographs. My work, whether realistic or abstract, has always dealt with a form of religion or imagination.”

Form Imagination Photograph Abstract Realistic

Book:Ralph Eugene Meatyard : the family album of Lucybelle Crater and other figurative photographs

Source: Ralph Eugene Meatyard : the family album of Lucybelle Crater and other figurative photographs

“I work in several different groups of pictures which act on and with each other - ranging from several abstracted manners to a form for the surreal. I have been called a preacher - but, in reality, I'm more generally philosophical. I have never made an abstracted photograph without content. An educated background in Zen influences all of my photographs. It has been said that my work resembles, more closely than any photographer, Le Douanier Rousseau - working in a fairly isolated area and feeding mostly on myself - I feel that I am a primitive photographer.”

“I think I have been able to eliminate the idea of a third person: the Intruding Photographer.”

Thinking Persons Has Beens Ideas Able Thirds Photographer Third Person

Author:Ralph Eugene Meatyard

“I want to get people to read stone, tree, so forth & so on through the construction of the picture, to lead them to these things exactly as if it were written out on a page. I think it can be done.”

People Ifs Thinking Want Done Written Tree Pages Stones Construction

Author:Ralph Eugene Meatyard

“I found out that I could not choose a subject, throw it out of focus, and then have a good picture. I found that I had to learn to see No-focus from the beginning.”

Found Focus Subjects

Author:Ralph Eugene Meatyard

“I like the obvious statement, although some people might wish to think they aren't there, that they will go away with time.”

People Thinking Might Wish Obvious Statements Going Away

Author:Ralph Eugene Meatyard

About the Author

Born: May 15, 1925
Died: May 7, 1972
Known for: Photographer
Quotes: 8

Books & Sources

Ralph Eugene Meatyard : the family album of Lucybelle Crater and other figurative photographsRelated source material

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