"Somebody said recently that the best thing a student could do was to get in some shows and publish a book; but nothing about becoming a human being, nothing about having important feelings or concepts of humanity. That's the sort of thing that is bad education. I'd say be a human being first and if you happen to wind up using photography, that's good for photography."
"The brightest light makes the blackest mark."
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Source: Henry Holmes Smith, James Enyeart (1986). “Henry Holmes Smith: collected writings 1935-1985”, Center for Creative Photography
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"I think control is the wrong word. I would put it this way. You see a lovely girl across a crowded room and you walk toward her with hope in your mind. That's the way [my] pictures are made."
"The intensely felt subjective image is always the reason for making a first rate picture."
"People are competing to win at a game that is a loser's game. The game is to have better routine images than someone else's routine images. If you want a prescription for routine images, you just have to go through any student's portfolio."
"In a world of disturbing images, the general body of photography is bland, dealing complacently with nature and treating our preconceptions as insights. Strange, private worlds rarely slip past our guard."