Elliott Erwitt
To me, photography is an art of observation. It's about finding something interesting in an ordinary place... I've found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.Collection: Art
The advantage of taking pictures of the famous is that they get published.Collection: Famous
I appreciate simplicity, true beauty that lasts over time, and a little wit and eclecticism that make life more fun.Collection: Beauty
I enjoy nothing more than spending time with my loved ones, young and old, and at least once a year we get together for a formal family photograph.Collection: Family
I'm not a serious photographer like many of my contemporaries. That is to say, I am serious about not being serious.
You can find pictures anywhere. It's simply a matter of noticing things and organizing them. You just have to care about what's around you and have a concern with humanity and the human comedy.
A visual sense is something you either have or you don't.
My 'work' is about seeing not about ideas.
The ratio of successful shots is one in God-knows-how-many. Sometimes you'll get several in one contact sheet, and sometimes it's none for days. But as long as you go on taking pictures, you're likely to get a good one at some point.
It's almost embarrassing, but I do have one trick for taking portraits on commission. I carry one of these little bicycle horns in my pocket, and once in a while, when someone is sour-faced or stiff, I blow my horn. It sort of shatters the barriers. It's silly, but it works.
Be sure to take the lens cap off before photographing.
I'm an amateur photographer, apart from being a professional one, and I think maybe my amateur pictures are the better ones.
Everybody's got to do something... I'd been on my own since an early age and I thought I better find something to do to buy biscuits and stuff. From high school onwards I was earning my way with photography, one way or another, working in darkrooms and taking pictures of weddings, neighbors' children and so on.
Now very often events are set up for photographers... The weddings are orchestrated about the photographers taking the picture, because if it hasn't been photographed it doesn't really exist.
Somehow Photoshop and the ease with which one can produce an image has degraded the quality of photography in general.
I don't really have a favorite camera. I use a Leica and Canon a lot. It depends, especially professionally, on the requirements. But my carry-around camera is a Leica.
Making books is a very specific kind of activity. It's not really a collection of your best pictures - although it is - but it's also a way of presenting your work so that it's not repetitive, so that it flows, and so that it makes sense in a book.
Photography is pretty simple stuff. You just react to what you see, and take many, many pictures.
In those simpler days, you could just take pictures of movie stars and show them the way they were, as normal human beings. And if I felt part of any movement at the time, it was just to do that - to be journalistic and photograph what is, rather than what is made up.
I'll always be an amateur photographer.
All of my marriages lasted seven years.
Most photographers work best alone, myself included.
If your subjects are eternal... they'll survive.
Covering a historic event is perfectly legitimate. It's not sneaking into somebody's boudoir... These people belong to history, and not to record that if you have the opportunity would be wrong.
Professionally I've evolved with what's required, but the pictures I do for pleasure haven't changed, except for the cars in the background, the clothing. I haven't changed at all.
My life has been quite interesting professionally.
I've been around so long, most editors think I'm dead.
When I get up in the morning I brush my teeth and go about my business, and if I am going anywhere interesting I take my camera along.
The thing is that when you don't carry a camera, that's when you see pictures in particular, or at least that's when you think you see pictures in particular. When you do carry it, if you do see one on the occasion that you do, you can take it.
I like museums in Berlin a lot, especially in the eastern part. They're extraordinarily good.
The most awful museums are in China. They have magnificent stuff on display and just the worst way of displaying it. They just don't spend money on lighting and installation.
Color is descriptive. Black and white is interpretive.Collection: Black And White
The whole point of taking pictures is so that you don't have to explain things with words.Collection: Inspirational
Photography is an art of observation - it's about creating something extraordinary out of the ordinary. You choose a frame and then wait until the right time for something magical to come along and fill it.Collection: Photography
All the technique in the world doesn't compensate for the inability to notice.Collection: Photography
Photography is simply a function of noticing things.Collection: Photography
If you're not a curious person, you're certainly not going to be a good photographer.Collection: Photographer
Good photography is not about Zone Printing or any other Ansel Adams nonsense. It's just about seeing. You either see or you don't see. The rest is academic. Photography is simply a function of noticing things. Nothing more.Collection: Photography
I am serious about not being serious.Collection: Serious
Dogs don't mind being photographed in compromising situations.Collection: Dog
After following the crowd for a while, I'd then go 180 degrees in the exact opposite direction. It always worked for me.Collection: Opposites
It's about reacting to what you see, hopefully without preconception. You can find pictures anywhere. It's simply a matter of noticing things and organising them. You just have to care about what's around you and have a concern with humanity and the human comedy.Collection: Photography
The best things happen when you just happen to be somewhere with a camera.Collection: Cameras
A picture should be looked at - not talked about.Collection: Photography
I like to think I keep my mind open. When I walk the streets I don't look for anything in particular. I come from a philosophy that believes you shouldn't have preconceived notions - that you don't need a gimmick. That you should just photograph what you react to - what you see.Collection: Photography
The work I care about is terribly simple. I observe. I try to entertain. But above all I want my pictures to be emotional. Little else interests me in photography.Collection: Photography
You don't study photography. You do it.Collection: Photography
Nothing happens when you sit at home. I always make it a point to carry a camera with me at all times...I just shoot at what interests me at that moment.Collection: Photography
It's about time we started to take photography seriously and treat it as a hobby.Collection: Photography
The advice I would give to any photographer - young, old or in-between - is to explore anything visual because this is, after all, how you express your artistry. Look at paintings, movies, drawings, sculptures - look at anything visual and try to integrate that into your visual sense. After that, go out and take pictures and keep on taking pictures!Collection: Photography