Quotes & Sayings About Social Documentary Photography

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

To me documentary photography means making a picture so that the viewer doesn't think about the man who made the picture. At its esthetic core is very old tradition in art: naturalism. And its purpose is to document all facets of social relationships. — Aaron Siskind

Documentary photography has amassed mountains of evidence. And yet ... the genre has simultaneously contributed much to spectacle, to retinal excitation, to voyeurism, to terror, envy and nostalgia, and only a little to the critical understanding of the social world. — Allan Sekula

Many people in this world do jobs that are dangerous and where their life is at risk and they feel that there is some kind of value to their job I guess that's how I feel about what I do. There is a social function to documentary photography that is very important and it requires people to take risks. — James Nachtwey