Best photography & documentaries Quotes

“For me, documentary photography has always come with great responsibility. Not just to tell the story honestly and with empathy, but also to make sure the right people hear it. When you photograph somebody who is in pain or discomfort, they trust you to make sure the images will act as their advocate.”

People Stories Pain Responsibility Photography Empathy Photograph Honestly Documentaries Discomfort Great Responsibility Documentary Photography

Author:Giles Duley

“I may be wrong, but the essential illustrative nature of most documentary photography, and the worship of the object per se, in our best nature photography, is not enough to satisfy the man of today, compounded as he is of Christ, Freud, and Marx.”

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Author:Aaron Siskind

“Documentary: That’s a sophisticated and misleading word. And not really clear… The term should be documentary style… You see, a document has use, whereas art is really useless.”

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Author:Walker Evans

“Documentary photography is becoming more illustrative as people become more familiar with photography’s limitations and vulnerabilities. Reality has always been interpreted through layers of manipulation, abstraction, and intervention. But now, it is very much on the surface. I like this honesty about its dishonesty. Every photograph has many truths and none. Photographs are ambiguous, no matter how seemingly scientific they appear to be. They are always subject to an uncontrollable context. This is a tired statement, but worth repeating.”

“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.”

Ifs Kind Would Be Information Emotional Photography Photographer Photograph Pounds Documentaries Haiku Documentary Photography

Author:Sally Mann

“The very act of representation has been so thoroughly challenged in recent years by postmodern theories that it is impossible not to see the flaws everywhere, in any practice of photography. Traditional genres in particular-journalism, documentary studies, and fine-art photography-have become shells, or forms emptied of meaning.”

“I have always felt that a lot of the most interesting work, not just mine but other people's, falls into [the] nether area, somewhere between the worlds of documentary and photojournalism (two very vague words) and the world of art. I think a lot of street photography falls into this nether area.”

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Author:Alex Webb

“Many people in this world do jobs that are dangerous and where their life is at risk and they feel that there is some kind of value to their job I guess that's how I feel about what I do. There is a social function to documentary photography that is very important and it requires people to take risks.”

People World Feels Kind Important Jobs Life Is Values Social Risk Dangerous This World Photography Function Documentaries Documentary Photography

Author:James Nachtwey

“The dismal half-baked images of the average "reportage" and "documentary" photography are self dammning... the slick manner, the slightly obscure significance, the esoteric fear of simple beauty for its own sake - I am deeply concerned with these manifestations of decay. Gene Smith's work validates my most vigorous convictions that if the documentary photographs is to be truly effective it must contain elements of art, intensity, fine craft and spirituality. All these his work contains and we may turn to his work with gratitude, appreciation and great respect.”

“I think photojournalism is documentary photography with a purpose.”

Thinking Purpose Photography Documentaries Photojournalism Documentary Photography

Author:W. Eugene Smith

“When you say documentary, you have to have a sophisticated ear to receive that word. It should be documentary style, because documentary is police photography of a scene and a murder ... that's a real document. You see, art is really useless, and a document has use. And therefore, art is never a document, but it can adopt that style. I do it. I'm called a documentary photographer. But that presupposes a quite subtle knowledge of this distinction.”

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Book:Walker Evans and Jane Ninas in New Orleans, 1935-1936

Source: Walker Evans and Jane Ninas in New Orleans, 1935-1936

“[Documentary photography] is unwittingly literary, because it is nothing other than an observation of contemporary life apprehended at the right moment by an artist capable of seizing it. (1928)”

Moments Artist Photography Capable Contemporary Observation Documentaries Right Moment Seizing Contemporary Life Documentary Photography

Author:Pierre Mac Orlan

“I need there to be documentary photographers, because my work is meta-documentary; it is a commentary about the documentary use of photography.”

Needs Use Photography Photographer Documentaries Commentary

Author:Joan Fontcuberta

“Photography is the typical means of expression of a society founded on a civilization of technicians, conscious of the aims it has set for itself... Its power of exactly reproducing external reality, a power inherent in its technique, lends it a documentary character and makes it appear as the most faithful and impartial process for the reproduction of social life.”

Mean Character Reality Social Process Expression Civilization Photography Conscious Aim Technique Faithful Inherent Typical Documentaries Social Life Reproduction Technicians Reproducing

Author:Gisele Freund

“Documentary photography has amassed mountains of evidence. And yet... the genre has simultaneously contributed much to spectacle, to retinal excitation, to voyeurism, to terror, envy and nostalgia, and only a little to the critical understanding of the social world.”

World Littles Social Understanding Mountain Photography Evidence Terror Critical Envy Nostalgia Genre Documentaries Documentary Photography

Book:Dismal science: photo works, 1972-1996

Source: Dismal science: photo works, 1972-1996

“One of the most recent things we did [in Perceval Press] is a reissue of a fantastic documentary about Russian prison tattoo culture by Alix Lambert called The Mark of Cain. We've done books from Twilight of Empire, that actually has forewords by Howard Zinn and Dennis Kucinich and others, to books of poetry, photography, painting - all kinds of books.”

Kind Book Done Culture Painting Photography Mark Presses Prison All Kinds Fantastic Empires Twilight Tattoo Documentaries Cain

Author:Viggo Mortensen

“A good print is really essential. I want to take strong documentary photographs that are as good technically as any of the best technical photographs, and as creative as any of the best fine-art photographs. [...] I don't want to just be a photo essayist; I'm more interested in single images...ones that I feel are good enough to stand on their own.”

Want Feels Art Enough Strong Creative Fine Essentials Photography Photographer Photograph Print Good Enough Documentaries Fine Arts Essayists

Author:Mary Ellen Mark

“My first priority when taking pictures is to achieve clarity. A good documentary photograph transmits the information of the situation with the utmost fidelity; achieving it means understanding the nuances of lighting and composition, and also remembering to keep the lenses clean and the cameras steady.”

“A documentary photograph is not a factual photograph.”

Life Photography Photograph Documentaries Factual Documentary Photography

Book:Photographs of a Lifetime

Source: Photographs of a Lifetime

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