Gisele Freund Quotes & Sayings

For me, at least, studying my subjects first and knowing them personally was essential to taking a good picture. — Gisele Freund

Photography is the typical means of expression of a society founded on a civilization of technicians, conscious of the aims it has set for itself ... Its power of exactly reproducing external reality, a power inherent in its technique, lends it a documentary character and makes it appear as the most faithful and impartial process for the reproduction of social life. — Gisele Freund

When you do not like human beings, you cannot make good portraits. — Gisele Freund

Yet it seems so easy to take a photograph! One forgets that, apart from the technical aspects, photography can be a mental creation and the affirmation of a personality. What is marvelous about a photograph is that its possibilities are infinite; there aren't any subjects 'done to death'. — Gisele Freund

The lens, that allegedly impartial eye, permits all possible distortions of reality ... The importance of photography lies not only in the fact that it is a creation, but above all in the fact that it is one of the most effective means of shaping our ideas and influencing our behavior. — Gisele Freund

Before the first press pictures, the ordinary man would visualize only those events that took place near him, on his street or in his village. Photography opened a window. As the reader's outlook expanded, the world began to shrink. — Gisele Freund

In the theatre the stage keeps the audience aware of the fictional nature of the action. The reader poring over a magazine, on the other hand, identifies what he sees in the photographs as real. — Gisele Freund