Like the collector, the photographer is animated by a passion that, even when it appears to be for the present, is linked to a sense of the past.
Susan SontagRead
To photograph people is to violate them, by seeing them as they never see themselves, by having knowledge of them that they can never have.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote highlights the ethical implications of photography, particularly in how it captures the essence of individuals differently than they perceive themselves.
Susan Sontag's quote emphasizes the complexity of photography as an art form that not only captures reality but also influences our understanding of individuals. By stating that to photograph people is to 'violate' them, she points out the intimate power of the lens, suggesting that photographs can reveal truths about people that they themselves may not recognize, leading to a form of knowledge that can be intrusive and profound.
Themes
PhotographyIdentityPerceptionArtIntrusion
In practice
Example use cases
During a discussion on ethical photography practices in a workshop.
More from Susan Sontag
All quotes βScience fiction films are not about science. They are about disaster, which is one of the oldest subjects of art.
Susan SontagRead
Gide and I have attained such perfect intellectual communion that I experience the appropriate labor pains for every thought he gives birth to!
Susan SontagRead
Volume depends precisely on the writer's having been able to sit in a room every day, year after year, alone.
Susan SontagRead
In NY sensuality completely turns into sexuality - no objects for the senses to respond to, no beautiful river, houses, people. Awful smells of the street, and dirt... Nothing except eating, if that, and the frenzy of the bed.
Susan SontagRead
It hurts to love. It's like giving yourself to be flayed and knowing that at any moment the other person may just walk off with your skin.
Susan SontagRead
Similar quotes
The painter must give a completely free rein to any feeling or sensations he may have and reject nothing to which he is naturally drawn.
Lucian FreudRead
They [photographs] teach you about your own unraveling past, or about the immediacy of yesterday. They show you what you look at. If you take a photograph, you've been responsive to something, and you looked hard at it. Hard for a thousandth of a second, hard for ten minutes. But hard, nonetheless. And it's the quality of that bite that teaches you how connected you were to that thing, and where you stood in relation to it, then and now.
Joel MeyerowitzRead
I absolutely adore and idolise women. All women. I think they are all amazing. The female musicians I've met have been far more inspiring than the male ones. Women tend to be much more creative and ambitious. I think I may have been a woman in a past life.
Robert PlantRead
Art offers sanctuary to everyone willing to open their Hearts as well as their Eyes.
Nikki GiovanniRead
The artist's role isn't to tell people how to feel, but reflect.
John LennonRead
Low budgets force you to be more creative. Sometimes, with too much money, time and equipment, you can over-think. My way, you can use your gut instinct.
Robert RodriguezRead