I work only in 35mm format. I have a small bag so I can carry all my films with me for one or two months. That means I am completely independent and free.
-Sebastião Salgado
Click for larger image.
Church Gate Station, Bombay, Inida 1995 © Sebastião Salgado
Above all, I craved to seize the whole essence, in the confines of one single photograph, of some situation that was in the process of unrolling itself before my eyes.
-Henri Cartier-Bresson
HAMBURG, West Germany—Around the neck of a young man hangs a sign that reads, "I am looking for any kind of work," December 1952-January 1953. © Henri Cartier-Bresson / Magnum Photos
DESSAU, Germany—A transit camp, located between the American and Soviet zones, was organized for refugees, political prisoners, POWs, forced laborers, and displaced persons returning from the Eastern front of Germany after having been liberated by the Soviet army. A Belgian woman and former Gestapo informer, being identified as she tried to hide in the crowd, April 1945. © Henri Cartier-Bresson / Magnum Photos
MUNICH, West Germany—Oktoberfest, 1961. © Henri Cartier-Bresson / Magnum Photos
MUNICH, West Germany—Oktoberfest, 1961. © Henri Cartier-Bresson / Magnum Photos
MUNICH, West Germany—Oktoberfest, 1961. © Henri Cartier-Bresson / Magnum Photos
MUNICH, West Germany—Oktoberfest, 1961. © Henri Cartier-Bresson / Magnum Photos
HAMBURG, West Germany—December 1952-January 1953. © Henri Cartier-Bresson / Magnum Photos
André Kertész | Landing Pigeon, New York, 1960
This was taken around 59th Street where they had demolished the houses, and I saw a pigeon flying in and out. The original idea for this photograph dates back to my days in Paris, where I also saw some old run-down houses and wanted to photograph them with a pigeon. But the pigeon never came. Here in New York I sat and waited. Time and time again I went back to the same place, but it was never right. Then one day I saw the lonely pigeon. I took maybe two or three pictures. The moment was here. I had waited maybe thirty years for that instant.
-André Kertész, Kertész on Kertész
Ultimately, photography is about who you are. It is seeking the truth in relation to yourself. And seeking truth becomes a habit.
– Leonard Freed
JERUSALEM—Bible study, 1967. © Leonard Freed / Magnum Photos
I think that a lot of people, especially people who work for fashion magazines, feel that their photographs at times are really pretty much discarded or thrown away immediately because when you work for a magazine people today really don’t save magazines like they used to. I just think that as long as one can work and have a good time at it and at least learn something then you’re not discarding what you do. You go out and do a photograph. It should be all about getting onto another photograph.
-Bruce Weber
Featuring Daria Werbowy, Kate Moss, Lara Stone, Sasha Pivarova and styled by Alex White for the July 2008 issue of W Magazine.
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
© Bruce Weber, W Magazine
Rather than a profession, photography has always been a passion for me, a passion closer to an obsession.
-Marc Riboud
CHINA—Chinese actress Gong Li during the filming of To Live by Zhang Yimou, November 1993. © Marc Riboud / Magnum Photos
Von Unwerth seems less of an auteur directing her subjects than a co-conspirator who intimately knows the inner lives of these girls who want to have fun.
-American Photo
Evan Rachel Wood in the Italian edition of Max magazine, Ellen Von Unwerth
I think that, because I know what it feels like to be in front of the camera, I can be more sympathetic to my subjects. Being in front of the lens, you are very vulnerable. It’s not a nice feeling, and I don’t miss it. But it’s very helpful to know exactly what it’s like. When I was a model I hated when I wasn’t allowed to move, so I love movement and I encourage my subjects to play around, to move and to be silly.
-Ellen Von Unwerth
Evan Rachel Wood in the Italian edition of Max magazine, Ellen Von Unwerth
When it is a good shoot , it is better then a party! Gorgeous girls, loud music and a bottle of Champagne, or two…
-Ellen Von Unwerth
Evan Rachel Wood in the Italian edition of Max magazine, Ellen Von Unwerth
I’m just trying to make beautiful pictures. I don’t see my works as exploitative. They’re just cheeky, they’re fun, and the models aren’t complaining.
-Ellen Von Unwerth
Evan Rachel Wood in the Italian edition of Max magazine, Ellen Von Unwerth
My favourite photographers are Helmut Newton and Jaques Henri Lartigue: one for the strength, sexuality and humour and the other one for the lightness and charm.
-Ellen Von Unwerth
Evan Rachel Wood in the Italian edition of Max magazine, Ellen Von Unwerth
My boyfriend 22 years ago gave me a camera and a crash course about how it works, and that is how I started. I did reportage pictures in Kenya and shot my model friends, after I made them up and dressed them with my clothes. I knew already how to print black and white photos, as we had a lab in our tiny apartment.
-Ellen Von Unwerth
Evan Rachel Wood in the Italian edition of Max magazine, Ellen Von Unwerth
I think that women open up more to a female photographer. It’s like little girls playing around. You can be a bit naughty and do things you wouldn’t do in front of boys. It’s more relaxed somehow. I think it’s an empowering experience – and no, I don’t believe they are objectified.
-Ellen Von Unwerth
Evan Rachel Wood in the Italian edition of Max magazine, Ellen Von Unwerth
William McFadden has compiled an invaluable archive of Ellen von Unwerth’s work here.
Once, Henri [Cartier-Bresson] rang me in Paris and said, ‘Josef, [André] Kertész is in town, you must come to dinner and meet him.’ I said, ‘Henri, I love his pictures but I do not need to meet him.’ ‘No, you do not understand, you have to meet him because we three, we are of the same family.’ At the time, this seems to me to be an unbelievable thing to say. Now, though, when I look back from a distance, I can see that maybe there is something in that.
-Josef Koudelka
Stairs of Montmartre, Paris 1925, André Kertész
PRAGUE, Czechoslovakia—1992. © Josef Koudelka / Magnum Photos
Hyères, France, 1932 © Henri Cartier-Bresson / Magnum Photos
Brassed and beautiful. One of the great things about Leicas is that when they are used well over the years, brassing takes over the body. The black paint slowly disappears to reveal the warmth of the soft metal below. All of the Leicas that I have continually bought and sold over the years have been production M6 bodies and the top plates are made of a zinc alloy.
No brassing for me unless I buy an MP or an M4 or earlier.
Jim Marshall’s Leica M4:
Jim Marshall's Leica M4
It’s a very fine line to draw about taking pictures, you know, not invading someone’s privacy.
-Jim Marshall
Elliott Erwitt’s Leica M3:
Elliott Erwitt's Leica M3
All the technique in the world doesn’t compensate for the inability to notice.
-Elliot Erwitt
André Kertész | New York City, 1979
Everything that surrounds you can give you something. Last summer I stayed in my room most of the time and I began playing around with things. Years ago I was given a little primitive Polaroid camera and I didn’t like it–it was for snapshots. But one day I took it out. I had discovered, in the window of a shop, a little glass bust, and I was very moved because it resembled my wife–the shoulder and the neck were Elizabeth. For months and months I looked at the bust in the window and I finally bought it. The lady in the shop said, ‘It’s a beautiful bust, sir.’ ‘I know,’ I said. And I took it home, put it in my window, and began shooting and shooting with the Polaroid camera–in the morning, in the afternoon, in different lights. Something came out of this little incident, this little object. They made a book of all the pictures I took. It is dedicated to my wife. Look how the face of the bust is always changing: a shadow, which is the shadow of the curtain, then a passing cloud.
The sky and its reflection give it the expression. I didn’t arrange this thing–it was “there”. Photography cannot make nature more beautiful. Nature is the most beautiful thing in the world. You can show the beauty, illustrate it, but it is never the real beauty–very far from it. We don’t know how beautiful nature really is. We can only guess. I am always saying the best photographs are those I never took.
-André Kertész, Kertész on Kertész
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