Minor White Quotes & Sayings

It is curious that I always want to group things, a series of sonnets, a series of photographs; whatever rationalizations appear, they originate in urges that are rarely satisfied with single images. — Minor White

At first glance a photograph can inform us. At second glance it can reach us. — Minor White

To engage a sequence, we keep in mind the photographs on either side of the one in our eye. — Minor White

The development of a love of medium and a responsibility for one's own pictures is an overall goal. — Minor White

Students were taught by doing. — Minor White

Photographers who come up with power never get accused of imitating anyone else even though they photograph the same broom, same street, same portraits. — Minor White

If I have anything to give you through camera, it must be of myself. ... A gnawing burns inside ... to make something of myself worth giving. — Minor White

When gifts are given to me through my camera, I accept them graciously. — Minor White

The reason why we want to remember an image varies: because we simply 'love it,' or dislike it so intensely that it becomes compulsive, or because it has made us realize something about ourselves, or has brought about some slight change in us. Perhaps the reader can recall some image, after the seeing of which he has never been quite the same. — Minor White

When you approach something to photograph it, first be still with yourself until the object of your attention affirms your presence. Then don't leave until you have captured its essence. — Minor White

Photography is a language more universal than words. — Minor White

We could teach photography as a way to make a living, and best of all, somehow to get students to experience for themselves photography as a way of life. — Minor White

The state of mind of the photographer creating is a blank. I might add that this condition exists only at special times, namely when looking for pictures. -Something keeps him from falling off curbs, down open manholes, into bumpers of skidding trucks while in this condition but goes off duty at other times ... This is a very special kind of blank. A very active state of mind really, it is a very receptive state ... — Minor White

When I look at pictures I have made, I have forgotten what I saw in front of the camera and respond only to what I am seeing in the photographs. — Minor White

No matter how slow the film, Spirit always stands still long enough for the photographer it has chosen. — Minor White

While we cannot describe its appearance (the equivalent), we can define its function. When a photograph functions as an Equivalent we can say that at that moment, and for that person the photograph acts as a symbol or plays the role of a metaphor for something that is beyond the subject photographed. — Minor White

All photographs are self-portraits. — Minor White

Often while traveling with a camera we arrive just as the sun slips over the horizon of a moment, too late to expose film, only time enough to expose our hearts. — Minor White

The photographer projects himself into everything he sees, identifying himself with everything in order to know it and to feel it better. — Minor White

One does not photograph something simply for 'what it is', but 'for what else it is. — Minor White

Let the subject generate its own photographs. Become a camera. — Minor White

Camera and eye are together a time machine with which the mind and human being can do the same kind of violence to time and space as dreams. — Minor White

There's no particular class of photograph that I think is any better than any other class. I'm always and forever looking for the image that has spirit! I don't give a damn how it got made. — Minor White

We emphasized the creativeness that happens at the moment of seeing over the kind that takes place in the dark room. — Minor White

Different levels of photography require different levels of understanding and skill. A "press the button, let George do the rest" photographer needs little or no technical knowledge of photography. A zone system photographer takes more responsibility. He visualizes before he presses the button, and afterwards calibrates for predictable print values. — Minor White

In putting images together I become active, and excitement is of another order - synthesis overshadows analysis. — Minor White

The camera is first a means of self-discovery and a means of self-growth. The artist has one thing to say - himself. — Minor White

I'm always mentally photographing everything as practice. — Minor White

One should not only photograph things for what they are but for what else they are. — Minor White

To get from the tangible to the intangible (which mature artists in any medium claim as part of their task) a paradox of some kind has frequently been helpful. For the photographer to free himself of the tyranny of the visual facts upon which he is utterly dependent, a paradox is the only possible tool. And the talisman paradox for unique photography is to work "the mirror with a memory" as if it were a mirage, and the camera is a metamorphosing machine, and the photograph as if it were a metaphor ... . Once freed of the tyranny of surfaces and textures, substance and form [the photographer] can use the same to pursue poetic truth" (Minor White, Newhall, 281). — Minor White

Reaching a 'creative' state of mind thru positive action is considered preferable to waiting for 'inspiration'. — Minor White

Insight, vision, moments of revelation. During those rare moments something overtakes the man and he becomes the tool of a greater Force; the servant of, willing or unwilling depending on his degree of awakeness. The photograph, then, is a message more than a mirror, and the mans a messenger who happens to be a photographer. — Minor White

When I looked at things for what they are I was fool enough to persist in my folly and found that each photograph was a mirror of my Self. — Minor White

If all your life means to you is water running over rocks, then photograph it, but I want to create something that would not have existed without me. — Minor White

Some of the young photographers today enter photography where I leave off. My "grandchildren" astound me. What I worked for they seem to be born with. So I wonder where Their affirmations of Spirit will lead. My wish for them is that their unfolding proceeds to fullness of Spirit, however astonishing or anguished their lives. — Minor White

Watching the way the current moves a blade of grass - sometimes I've seen that happen and it has just turned me inside out. — Minor White

Sometimes we work so fast that we don't really understand what's going on in front of the camera. We just kind of sense that, 'Oh my God, it's significant!' and photograph impulsively while trying to get the exposure right. Exposure occupies my mind while intuition frames the images. — Minor White

Innocence of eye has a quality of its own. It means to see as a child sees, with freshness and acknowledgment of the wonder; it also means to see as an adult sees who has gone full circle and once again sees as a child - with freshness and an even deeper sense of wonder. — Minor White

I have often photographed when I am not in tune with nature but the photographs look as if I had been. So I conclude that something in nature says, 'Come and take my photograph.' So I do, regardless of how I feel. — Minor White

Before he has seen the whole, how unusually perceptive and imaginative the person must be to evolve the entire sequence by meditating on its single, pair or triplet of essential images. — Minor White

A very receptive state of mind ... not unlike a sheet of film itself - seemingly inert, yet so sensitive that a fraction of a second's exposure conceives a life in it. — Minor White