"When you can't think of anything else, photograph graffiti, nudes, or plants."
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Quote collection
Bill Jay quotes (page 1 of 3)
44 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"If there is a single factor which separates the best photographers from the wannabes it is the quantity of images which they produce. They seem to be forever shooting. I have watched many of them as they take picture after picture even when they are not photographing. [...] Often these intimate images do not look as though they were taken by the same photographer. And that is their fascination and charm."
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"Predators and prey always coexist. That's why we have galleries as well as photographers."
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"Evolution in action: First, God said, 'Let there be light.' Then, he created two nude models. Now we have photographers."
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"Ask photographers to write and they have nothing to say; ask them to talk about their work and they won't shut up."
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"This is life. It is everywhere, and it is here for the taking. I am alive and I know this, now, in a more profound way than when I am doing anything else. These sights are ephemeral, fleeting treasures that have been offered to me and to me alone. No other person in the history of the world, anywhere in all of time and space, has been granted this gift to be here in my place. And I am privileged, through the camera, to take this moment away with me. That is why I photograph."
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"But there are times when thinking is misplaced, like when taking photographs. You cannot think your way to making photographs; you can photograph your way to clearer thinking."
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"...photographers who carry 60 pounds of equipment up a hill to photograph a view are not suffering enough, although their whining causes enough suffering among their listeners. No, if they really expect us to respect their search for enlightenment and artistic expression, in [the] future they will drag the equipment up the hill by their genitals and take the view with a tripod leg stuck through their foot."
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"Asked for your opinion on the prints, you have two choices: truth or tact. I ask for the bathroom."
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"Photographers have already photographed everything too many times, except cheese."
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"At exhibition openings always praise the chicken for laying eggs; you can wring its neck later."
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"The best way for photographers to become rich and famous is to go into another field."
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"'Ornithologists concluded that migratory birds take hundreds of naps as they fly; they also practice unilateral eye closure, in which one eye closes, thereby permitting half the brain to sleep.' Is this what happens when photographers close one eye to look through a viewfinder? If so, they might be operating with only half a brain. Perhaps that explains."
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"Why do photographers photograph? To make unreality visible."
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"Advice to artists: always take the opportunity to shut up."
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"I agree, intellectualism in photography is overrated. I just wish it could be replaced by common sense."
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"Discussions allow photographers to shuffle their prejudices"
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"I'd like my coffin to be a camera obscura so I can see what's going on outside."
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"'I am a camera' but it is a discontinued model."
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"...the subject, the thing itself, is the genesis of all types of photography."
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