Mary Ellen Mark Quotes
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I'm a street photographer, but I'm interested in any ironic, whimsical images, and there's something very romantic about a circus.
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Looking at my own prom photograph reminds me of how significant that moment was - and how fleeting life is.
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I just think it's important to be direct and honest with people about why you're photographing them and what you're doing. After all, you are taking some of their soul.
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I work in colour sometimes, but I guess the images I most connect to, historically speaking, are in black and white. I see more in black and white - I like the abstraction of it.
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One of my all-time favorite photographers is Irving Penn. I wish I could have watched him work.
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You don't need to retouch if you know how to light.
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I really knew when I started photographing I wanted it to be a way of knowing different cultures, not just in other countries but in this country, too, and I knew I wanted to be a voyeur.
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I respect newspapers, but the reality is that magazine 'photojournalism' is finished. They want illustrations, Photoshopped pictures of movie stars.
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I don't relax. I can't take vacations. I'm obsessive-compulsive, and I worry with every project that I'm going to fail. When it starts to go well, and I sense that something beautiful and important and meaningful is being created, it's a fantastic feeling, and I find it very hard to stop.
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I'm not against digital photography. It's great for newspapers. And there are photographers doing great work digitally. When they use Photoshop as a darkroom tool, that's fine, too. But at this point of my life, after so many years, I don't really want to change, and I still love film.
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If I'm in an unusual or extreme social environment, I always want to know what it's like to grow up there and experience it as normal, everyday life. And I want to know what sort of adults these children are going to turn into.
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I remember the first time I went out on the street to shoot pictures. I was in downtown Philadelphia, and I just took a walk and started making contact with people and photographing them, and I thought, 'I love this. This is what I want to do forever.' There was never another question.
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I've always been interested in photographing traditions and customs - especially in America. The prom is an American tradition, a rite of passage that has always been one of the most important rituals of American youth. It is a day in our lives that we never forget - a day full of hopes and dreams for our future.
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The obsessions we have are pretty much the same our whole lives. Mine are people, the human condition, life.
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I don't like to photograph children as children. I like to see them as adults, as who they really are. I'm always looking for the side of who they might become.
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I wanted to travel from the beginning. As a kid, I used to dream about airplanes, before I ever flew in one.
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I think the prom is very serious also. It's an American ritual, it's a rite of passage, and it's very much a part of this country.
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It's good that everyone has an opportunity to take pictures, the chance to be a photographer. Some are good, too. But the bad thing is that it's very, very difficult to take a great picture. Everyone can take a good picture - even a child - but it's hard to make a great one.
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I have an incredible relationship with dogs. I'm kind of a dog-whisperer.
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When I started out, it was considered very wrong to change an image. There were scandals if someone inserted a sky into a war picture or something. Now it's all about that.
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Usually my ideas for work have revolved around my interest in people, especially people that live on the edges of society.
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I always think, 'What does this picture mean? What's the best place to put my camera? Do I have anything extra in the picture, things in the background that will distract? Am I in the basic position that will give the essential things for this picture but not too much?'
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What you look for in a picture is a metaphor, something that means something more, that makes you think about things you've seen or thought about.
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I love dogs. I absolutely adore them. When I'm teaching in Mexico, I rescue dogs from the streets and make my students adopt them.