All good art is abstract in its structure. Paul Strand More Quotes by Paul Strand More Quotes From Paul Strand Objectivity is of the very essence of photography, its contribution and at the same time its limitation Paul Strand objectivityphotographyessence I think of myself as an explorer who has spent his life on a long voyage of discovery. Paul Strand discoverylongthinking Photography is only a new road from a different direction, but moving toward the common goal, which is life. Paul Strand photographygoalmoving All light is available light. Paul Strand availablelight Whether a watercolor is inferior to an oil [painting], or whether a drawing, an etching, or a photograph is not as important as either, is inconsequent. To have to despise something in order to respect something else is a sign of impotence. Paul Strand oildrawingorder The documentary photographer aims his camera at the real world to record truthfulness. At the same time, he must strive for form, to devise effective ways of organizing and using the material. For content and form are interrelated. The problems presented by content and form must be so developed that the result is fundimentally [sic] true to the realities of life as we know it. The chief problem is to find a form that adequately represents the reality. Paul Strand recordscamerasreal The camera machine cannot evade the objects which are in front of it. When the photographer selects this movement, the light, the objects, he must be true to them. If he includes in his space a strip of grass, it must be felt as the living differentiated thing it is and so recorded. It must take its proper but no less important place as a shape and a texture in relationship to the mountain tree or what not, which are included. Paul Strand spacelighttree If Ansel Adams gets a thousand dollars a print, I want ten thousand. Paul Strand printdollarswant I don't care how you photograph - use the kitchen mop if you must, but if the product is not true to the laws of photography... you have produced something that is dead. (1923) Paul Strand kitchenphotographylaw To be a photographer you must have something to say about the world. Paul Strand photographerworld The artist is one who makes a concentrated statement about the world in which he lives and that statement tends to become impersonal-it tends to become universal and enduring because it comes out of something very particular. Paul Strand endureartistworld Did I express my personality? I think that's quite unimportant because it's not people's selves but what they have to say about life that's important. Paul Strand photographyselfthinking Look at the things around you, the immediate world around you. If you are alive, it will mean something to you, and if you care enough about photography, and if you know how to use it, you will want to photograph that meaningness. If you let other people's vision get between the world and your own, you will achieve that extremely common and worthless thing, a pictorial photograph. Paul Strand photographymeanpeople The existence of a medium, after all, is its absolute justification, if as so many seem to think, it needs one and all comparison of potentialities is useless and irrelevant. Whether a water-color is inferior to an oil, or whether a drawing, an etching, or a photograph is not as important as either, is inconsequent. To have to despise something in order to respect something else is a sign of impotence. [emphasis added] Let us rather accept joyously and with gratitude everything through which the spirit of man seeks to an ever fuller and more intense self-realization. Paul Strand gratitudementhinking
