Brandon Stanton Quotes
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I am interviewing people with a spirit of genuine interest and compassion, and therefore, the general tone of the site is one of genuine interest and compassion. The moment that culture changes, 'Humans of New York' is no longer viable.
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It's the rejection that is hard. It's not the interviewing that's hard. It's not the photography that's hard. It's, you know, approaching people all day long and having a good portion of those people reject you and some of them be rude.
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At some point during my travels, I had a slight change of focus which would end up defining the rest of my career. I began taking pictures of people. In addition to all the buildings, street signs and fire hydrants, I started photographing some of the interesting humans that passed by me on the street.
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You know you are an artist if you appreciate beauty.
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When you are interviewing refugees, each person you talk to has a different story that could come from a horror movie. So many people talk about seeing their families get murdered before their eyes. Then I go to Central Park, and people are talking about their third divorce and paying tuition.
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I'm a believer in the ordinary person, that the ordinary person is just as important and has an equally unique perspective on the world as someone who is famous or perhaps more privileged.
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I think everyone feels alone in their sadness, and there's a certain value to hearing other people's sad stories.
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I don't think there's any better education than learning the intimate details of the lives of people who you most admire.
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Each time I arrived in a new city, I'd get lost in the streets and photograph everything that looked interesting, taking nearly a thousand photographs every day. After each day of shooting, I'd select 30 or 40 of my favorite photographs and post them on Facebook. I named the albums after my first impression of each city.
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I struck upon this kind of crazy idea that I was going to go to New York and stop 10,000 people on the streets and take their portrait and create kind of a photographic census of the city.
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I've done commercial work for Amtrak. However, that was branded as Stanton. I stipulated at the very beginning that it was not going to involve 'Humans of New York,' that I wasn't going to promote it on 'Humans of New York.' So nobody who follows me really even knows that I did it.
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Wherever I go, I just try to show normal life. If the work helps to dispel stereotypes, it's because I seek not to portray the extremities of a place, but the vast majority of people who are quite normal and are having normal life experiences.
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'Humans of New York' did not result from a flash on inspiration. It grew from five years of experimenting, tinkering, and messing up.
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Without social media, I'd probably just be a quirky, amateur photographer with a hard drive full of photos. I'd be cold calling respected publications, begging for a feature.
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I don't like to interview people in front of their friends; they clam up.
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I was making projections about 'Humans of New York,' back when I had zero followers, that made all my friends and family roll their eyes. I'd throw out these huge numbers: 'One day, a million people are gonna be looking at this. Trust me.' And even those wild, wild numbers I was throwing out have just been smashed. So, it's a good feeling.
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The only things I make money on are speeches and books.
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Social media is a superimposing place where people are usually bragging.
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I think it's important to try to get on a kid's level when taking their photo.
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In July of 2010, I lost my finance job in Chicago. Instead of updating my resume and looking for a similar job, I decided to forget about money and have a go at something I truly enjoyed. I'd purchased a semi-professional camera earlier that year and spent my free time taking photos in downtown Chicago.
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Of all the places I've been, India is the one that's on the top of my list to return to.
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I didn't actually begin photographing, or even visit New York, for the first time until I was 26.
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I know I have a caption that I'm going to use when somebody tells me something I've never heard before. It's very rarely a thought, a philosophy, when somebody says, 'Oh, I don't like cheese' or 'Oh, I think the government should be overthrown,' because so many people share these thoughts. But what people don't share is stories.
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If I had sat around and waited until I had an idea to be a successful photographer, I would still be in finance.