I'm an escapist. I'm not a planner; I've never made a decision about anything in my life. The good thing about Africa is that you can escape forever. You can do what you want without someone looking over your shoulder. Peter Beard More Quotes by Peter Beard More Quotes From Peter Beard I like things that don't look like you're in control. It's like life itself. You just learn how to benefit from accidents and chances that you take. Peter Beard benefits chance looks Like society, the diary is a world of useless secrets. Everything is there, yet there is nothing. Peter Beard useless secret diaries I am a parasite off beauty. Peter Beard parasites The whole world is a scab. The point is to pick it constructively. Peter Beard scabs whole world I think the camera is a wonderful machine, don't you? And not to take photographs in this century is crazy. Peter Beard machines crazy thinking Photography should be redefined. It's largely technical... Photography is just unbelievably limiting. I always think of David Bailey and all the fashion photographers - they overlap, you can't always tell who did it. I don't really even like photography all that much. I just think it's so overdone. Peter Beard fashion photography thinking I used to do horseback riding in the South, and it was just things I'd be pasting. I think my diaries was just an infantile desire to record things. I liked saving things instead of writing. Peter Beard desire writing thinking Being so pathetic, I don't read. I just ... do things - writing out interviews you can't read, on pictures of footprints and things like that. I kind of like the idea of nailing the thing down and not really showing too much about it. There's just so much you can take for collage nowadays. Peter Beard footprint kind writing I had some highlight moments in the early '60s when I used to do a lot of rubbings. I used Afta; it's an amazing chemical. If you pour it on something and rub, you get amazing results. Before that, I used lighter fluid and, well, I've always liked blood. Everybody thinks I am very sick, but the thing is, blood is better than any ink or paint. Peter Beard sick moments thinking The last thing left in nature is the beauty of women. Peter Beard left women nature beauty I'm learning that human pressure on wildlife is becoming increasingly dangerous. You've got to be more alert because more animals have been pushed around, wounded, subjected to human harassment, ambushed, all kinds of stress. When they attack, it's totally predictable. Peter Beard you learning stress pressure I don't mind the word 'dilettante.' A dilettante means someone who does what he loves. Peter Beard someone he who mind Conservation is for guilty people on Park Avenue with poodles and Pekingeses. Peter Beard park conservation guilty people It's such a waste, sleep. You're just lying there. Peter Beard just you waste sleep The institution of marriage should be re-examined because of its overwhelming claustrophobia. The odds are stacked against spontaneity and effervescence. It's an institution that was brought about for the sake of family and children, but biologically, it's very unnatural. It's masochism and torture the way it's been organized. Peter Beard marriage family children way I made a life for myself in Africa that was as far as you could possibly get from art school at Yale. Peter Beard myself you life art An artist who goes around proclaiming that the art he's making is art is probably making a serious mistake. And that's one mistake I try not to make. Peter Beard serious artist mistake art I did have a very advanced grandmother, my mother's mother, who wanted to buy me a camera. My parents wouldn't let her. Eventually she won, and I got a camera in about 1948, a Voigtlander. Peter Beard camera parents me mother I graduated. I did History of Art, you know, all those things - American Studies - and then I went to art school, and I did Joseph Alvarez in the art school. Peter Beard you history art school I'm for conservation, but it's mostly a con. That's the trouble. It's sentimental. Buy an elephant a drink, a lion an acre. Peter Beard elephant lion drink trouble
