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.
Interpretation
The essence of a photograph lies in its spirit, not in its class or technique.
In this quote, Minor White emphasizes the importance of the underlying spirit or essence of a photograph over its technical qualities or classification. He believes that any photograph, regardless of how it was created or the category it falls into, can possess beauty and meaning, suggesting that the emotional impact is what truly matters in photography.
In practice
During an art exhibition speech emphasizing the emotional connection to photography.
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.
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.
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.
One does not photograph something simply for 'what it is', but 'for what else it is.
One should not only photograph things for what they are but for what else they are.
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.
What do I ask of a painting? I ask it to astonish, disturb, seduce, convince.
I always had a great appreciation for jazz, but I'm a very pedestrian musician. I get by. I like to think that my main instrument is vocabulary.
I've always wanted to create drama in my pictures, which is why I paint people. It's people who have brought drama to pictures from the beginning. The simplest human gestures tell stories.
Do everything by hand, even when using the computer.
A revolutionary poem will not tell you who or when to kill, what and when to burn, or even how to theorize. It reminds you... where and when and how you are living and might live, it is a wick of desire.
If you imagine the world listening, you'll never write a line. That's why privacy is so important. You should write first drafts as if they will never be shown to anyone.
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